diff --git a/libnm-core/nm-core-internal.h b/libnm-core/nm-core-internal.h
index 60774c49b3..68f453a17f 100644
--- a/libnm-core/nm-core-internal.h
+++ b/libnm-core/nm-core-internal.h
@@ -250,6 +250,8 @@ guint nm_setting_ethtool_init_features (NMSettingEthtool *setting,
 guint8 *_nm_utils_hwaddr_aton (const char *asc, gpointer buffer, gsize buffer_length, gsize *out_length);
 const char *nm_utils_hwaddr_ntoa_buf (gconstpointer addr, gsize addr_len, gboolean upper_case, char *buf, gsize buf_len);
 
+gboolean nm_utils_is_valid_iface_name_utf8safe (const char *utf8safe_name);
+
 GSList *    _nm_utils_hash_values_to_slist (GHashTable *hash);
 
 GHashTable *_nm_utils_copy_strdict (GHashTable *strdict);
diff --git a/libnm-core/nm-utils.c b/libnm-core/nm-utils.c
index 88cdee36e3..dbeb6601f4 100644
--- a/libnm-core/nm-utils.c
+++ b/libnm-core/nm-utils.c
@@ -4541,6 +4541,29 @@ _nm_utils_generate_mac_address_mask_parse (const char *value,
 
 /*****************************************************************************/
 
+gboolean
+nm_utils_is_valid_iface_name_utf8safe (const char *utf8safe_name)
+{
+	gs_free gpointer bin_to_free = NULL;
+	gconstpointer bin;
+	gsize len;
+
+	g_return_val_if_fail (utf8safe_name, FALSE);
+
+	bin = nm_utils_buf_utf8safe_unescape (utf8safe_name, &len, &bin_to_free);
+
+	if (bin_to_free) {
+		/* some unescaping happened... */
+
+		if (len != strlen (bin)) {
+			/* there are embedded NUL chars. Invalid. */
+			return FALSE;
+		}
+	}
+
+	return nm_utils_is_valid_iface_name (bin, NULL);
+}
+
 /**
  * nm_utils_is_valid_iface_name:
  * @name: Name of interface