diff --git a/util/cbfstool/common.c b/util/cbfstool/common.c
index e0474b3435..7e36b7f217 100644
--- a/util/cbfstool/common.c
+++ b/util/cbfstool/common.c
@@ -196,3 +196,20 @@ uint64_t intfiletype(const char *name)
 			return filetypes[i].type;
 	return -1;
 }
+
+char *bintohex(uint8_t *data, size_t len)
+{
+	static const char translate[16] = "0123456789abcdef";
+
+	char *result = malloc(len * 2 + 1);
+	if (result == NULL)
+		return NULL;
+
+	result[len*2] = '\0';
+	unsigned int i;
+	for (i = 0; i < len; i++) {
+		result[i*2] = translate[(data[i] >> 4) & 0xf];
+		result[i*2+1] = translate[data[i] & 0xf];
+	}
+	return result;
+}
diff --git a/util/cbfstool/common.h b/util/cbfstool/common.h
index 8073d12222..86ae484544 100644
--- a/util/cbfstool/common.h
+++ b/util/cbfstool/common.h
@@ -210,4 +210,11 @@ extern struct xdr xdr_le, xdr_be;
 size_t bgets(struct buffer *input, void *output, size_t len);
 size_t bputs(struct buffer *b, const void *data, size_t len);
 
+/* Returns a 0-terminated string containing a hex representation of
+ * len bytes starting at data.
+ * The string is malloc'd and it's the caller's responsibility to free
+ * the memory.
+ * On error, bintohex returns NULL.
+ */
+char *bintohex(uint8_t *data, size_t len);
 #endif