Hinnerk Altenburg

sub encode_utf_8 {
    my $string = @_;

    my $utf8_encoded = '';
    eval {
        $utf8_encoded = Encode::encode('UTF-8', $string, Encode::FB_CROAK);
    };
    if ($@) {
        # sanitize malformed UTF-8
        $utf8_encoded = '';
        my @chars = split(//, $string);
        foreach my $char (@chars) {
            my $utf_8_char = eval { Encode::encode('UTF-8', $char, Encode::FB_CROAK) }
                or next;
            $utf8_encoded .= $utf_8_char;
        }
    }
    return $utf8_encoded;
}