How to correct TypeError: Unicode-objects must be encoded before hashing?

I have this error:

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "python_md5_cracker.py", line 27, in <module>
  m.update(line)
TypeError: Unicode-objects must be encoded before hashing

when I try to execute this code in Python 3.2.2:

import hashlib, sys
m = hashlib.md5()
hash = ""
hash_file = input("What is the file name in which the hash resides?  ")
wordlist = input("What is your wordlist?  (Enter the file name)  ")
try:
  hashdocument = open(hash_file, "r")
except IOError:
  print("Invalid file.")
  raw_input()
  sys.exit()
else:
  hash = hashdocument.readline()
  hash = hash.replace("\n", "")

try:
  wordlistfile = open(wordlist, "r")
except IOError:
  print("Invalid file.")
  raw_input()
  sys.exit()
else:
  pass
for line in wordlistfile:
  # Flush the buffer (this caused a massive problem when placed 
  # at the beginning of the script, because the buffer kept getting
  # overwritten, thus comparing incorrect hashes)
  m = hashlib.md5()
  line = line.replace("\n", "")
  m.update(line)
  word_hash = m.hexdigest()
  if word_hash == hash:
    print("Collision! The word corresponding to the given hash is", line)
    input()
    sys.exit()

print("The hash given does not correspond to any supplied word in the wordlist.")
input()
sys.exit()

It is probably looking for a character encoding from wordlistfile.

wordlistfile = open(wordlist,"r",encoding='utf-8')

Or, if you're working on a line-by-line basis:

line.encode('utf-8')

---

EDIT

Per the comment below and this answer.

My answer above assumes that the desired output is a str from the wordlist file. If you are comfortable in working in bytes, then you're better off using open(wordlist, "rb"). But it is important to remember that your hashfile should NOT use rb if you are comparing it to the output of hexdigest. hashlib.md5(value).hashdigest() outputs a str and that cannot be directly compared with a bytes object: 'abc' != b'abc'. (There's a lot more to this topic, but I don't have the time ATM).

It should also be noted that this line:

line.replace("\n", "")

Should probably be

line.strip()

That will work for both bytes and str's. But if you decide to simply convert to bytes, then you can change the line to:

line.replace(b"\n", b"")

You must have to define encoding format like utf-8, Try this easy way,

This example generates a random number using the SHA256 algorithm:

>>> import hashlib
>>> hashlib.sha256(str(random.getrandbits(256)).encode('utf-8')).hexdigest()
'cd183a211ed2434eac4f31b317c573c50e6c24e3a28b82ddcb0bf8bedf387a9f'

import hashlib
string_to_hash = '123'
hash_object = hashlib.sha256(str(string_to_hash).encode('utf-8'))
print('Hash', hash_object.hexdigest())

The error already says what you have to do. MD5 operates on bytes, so you have to encode Unicode string into bytes, e.g. with line.encode('utf-8').

To store the password (PY3):

import hashlib, os
password_salt = os.urandom(32).hex()
password = '12345'

hash = hashlib.sha512()
hash.update(('%s%s' % (password_salt, password)).encode('utf-8'))
password_hash = hash.hexdigest()

encoding this line fixed it for me.

m.update(line.encode('utf-8'))

Please take a look first at that answer.

Now, the error message is clear: you can only use bytes, not Python strings (what used to be unicode in Python < 3), so you have to encode the strings with your preferred encoding: utf-32, utf-16, utf-8 or even one of the restricted 8-bit encodings (what some might call codepages).

The bytes in your wordlist file are being automatically decoded to Unicode by Python 3 as you read from the file. I suggest you do:

m.update(line.encode(wordlistfile.encoding))

so that the encoded data pushed to the md5 algorithm are encoded exactly like the underlying file.

You could open the file in binary mode:

import hashlib

with open(hash_file) as file:
    control_hash = file.readline().rstrip("\n")

wordlistfile = open(wordlist, "rb")
# ...
for line in wordlistfile:
    if hashlib.md5(line.rstrip(b'\n\r')).hexdigest() == control_hash:
       # collision

If it's a single line string. wrapt it with b or B. e.g:

variable = b"This is a variable"

or

variable2 = B"This is also a variable"

This program is the bug free and enhanced version of the above MD5 cracker that reads the file containing list of hashed passwords and checks it against hashed word from the English dictionary word list. Hope it is helpful.

I downloaded the English dictionary from the following link https://github.com/dwyl/english-words

# md5cracker.py
# English Dictionary https://github.com/dwyl/english-words 

import hashlib, sys

hash_file = 'exercise\hashed.txt'
wordlist = 'data_sets\english_dictionary\words.txt'

try:
    hashdocument = open(hash_file,'r')
except IOError:
	print('Invalid file.')
	sys.exit()
else:
    count = 0
    for hash in hashdocument:
        hash = hash.rstrip('\n')
        print(hash)
        i = 0
        with open(wordlist,'r') as wordlistfile:
            for word in wordlistfile:
                m = hashlib.md5()
                word = word.rstrip('\n')            
                m.update(word.encode('utf-8'))
                word_hash = m.hexdigest()
                if word_hash==hash:
                    print('The word, hash combination is ' + word + ',' + hash)
                    count += 1
                    break
                i += 1
        print('Itiration is ' + str(i))
    if count == 0:
        print('The hash given does not correspond to any supplied word in the wordlist.')
    else:
        print('Total passwords identified is: ' + str(count))
sys.exit()