diff --git a/app/src/main/java/io/appium/uiautomator2/utils/XMLHelpers.java b/app/src/main/java/io/appium/uiautomator2/utils/XMLHelpers.java
index dd08eec24..8810d871d 100644
--- a/app/src/main/java/io/appium/uiautomator2/utils/XMLHelpers.java
+++ b/app/src/main/java/io/appium/uiautomator2/utils/XMLHelpers.java
@@ -18,7 +18,6 @@
 
 import androidx.annotation.Nullable;
 
-import java.nio.charset.StandardCharsets;
 import java.util.regex.Pattern;
 
 public abstract class XMLHelpers {
@@ -51,18 +50,7 @@ public static String toNodeName(String str) {
     @Nullable
     public static String toSafeString(@Nullable Object source, String replacement) {
         return source == null ? null : XML10_PATTERN
-                .matcher(toSafeUtf8String(String.valueOf(source)))
+                .matcher(String.valueOf(source))
                 .replaceAll(replacement);
     }
-
-    @Nullable
-    public static String toSafeUtf8String(@Nullable String source) {
-        if (source == null) {
-            return null;
-        }
-
-        // This method always replaces malformed-input and unmappable-character sequences
-        // with this charset's default replacement byte array.
-        return new String(source.getBytes(StandardCharsets.UTF_8), StandardCharsets.UTF_8);
-    }
 }
diff --git a/app/src/test/java/io/appium/uiautomator2/utils/XMLHelpersTests.java b/app/src/test/java/io/appium/uiautomator2/utils/XMLHelpersTests.java
index 7815528f7..b7d6271e1 100644
--- a/app/src/test/java/io/appium/uiautomator2/utils/XMLHelpersTests.java
+++ b/app/src/test/java/io/appium/uiautomator2/utils/XMLHelpersTests.java
@@ -34,8 +34,6 @@
 
 import static org.junit.Assert.assertEquals;
 
-import static io.appium.uiautomator2.utils.XMLHelpers.toSafeString;
-
 import android.os.SystemClock;
 
 import java.io.ByteArrayInputStream;
@@ -240,12 +238,6 @@ private static List<Element> findNodesUsingXpath1(String xml, String xpathSelect
         }
     }
 
-    @Test
-    public void createsSafeXmlString() {
-        String text = toSafeString("°C\u000b", "?");
-        assertEquals(text, "°C?");
-    }
-
     @Test
     public void parsesComplexXpath1() {
         String query = "(//android.widget.TextView[@text='some, text']/following::android.widget.ImageButton)[1]";