diff --git a/vm_supervisor/vm/firecracker/instance.py b/vm_supervisor/vm/firecracker/instance.py
index be4f886ba..7831eec7d 100644
--- a/vm_supervisor/vm/firecracker/instance.py
+++ b/vm_supervisor/vm/firecracker/instance.py
@@ -237,7 +237,7 @@ def _create_network_file(self) -> bytes:
     def _create_metadata_file(self) -> bytes:
         """Creates metadata configuration file for cloud-init tool"""
 
-        hostname = base64.b32encode(self.vm_hash).decode().strip("=").lower()
+        hostname = base64.b32encode(str.encode(self.vm_hash)).decode().strip("=").lower()
 
         metadata = {
             "instance-id": f"iid-instance-{self.vm_id}",