diff --git a/src/utilities/core/CommonImport.i b/src/utilities/core/CommonImport.i
index 2004bde55b5..b35dae77900 100644
--- a/src/utilities/core/CommonImport.i
+++ b/src/utilities/core/CommonImport.i
@@ -11,6 +11,17 @@
   #include <boost/regex.hpp>
   #include <boost/variant.hpp>
   #include <pugixml.hpp>
+
+#if defined SWIGRUBY
+  extern "C" {
+  #ifdef HAVE_RUBY_ENCODING_H
+    #include "ruby/encoding.h"
+  #endif
+
+    rb_encoding *rb_utf8_encoding(void);
+    ID rb_intern3(const char *name, long len, rb_encoding *enc);
+  }
+#endif
 %}
 
 %include <utilities/core/Deprecated.hpp>
diff --git a/src/utilities/core/jsoncpp.i b/src/utilities/core/jsoncpp.i
index 4ebf7aa1c51..affa3d50030 100644
--- a/src/utilities/core/jsoncpp.i
+++ b/src/utilities/core/jsoncpp.i
@@ -73,7 +73,9 @@
 #endif
 
 #if defined SWIGRUBY
+
 %fragment("JsonToDict","header", fragment="SWIG_FromCharPtrAndSize") {
+
   SWIGINTERN VALUE SWIG_From_JsonValue(const Json::Value& value) {
 
     if (value.isNull()) {
@@ -108,7 +110,10 @@
     if (value.isObject()) {
       VALUE result = rb_hash_new();
       for( const auto& id : value.getMemberNames()) {
-        rb_hash_aset(result, ID2SYM(rb_intern(id.data())), SWIG_From_JsonValue(value[id]));
+        rb_hash_aset(result,
+                    ID2SYM(rb_intern3(id.data(), id.size(), rb_utf8_encoding())),
+                    SWIG_From_JsonValue(value[id])
+        );
       }
       return result;
     }