diff --git a/swift/common/db.py b/swift/common/db.py
index 1f70c89285..0c8e7ea3fc 100644
--- a/swift/common/db.py
+++ b/swift/common/db.py
@@ -19,7 +19,6 @@ from __future__ import with_statement
 from contextlib import contextmanager
 import hashlib
 import logging
-import operator
 import os
 from uuid import uuid4
 import sys
@@ -112,11 +111,8 @@ def chexor(old, name, timestamp):
     """
     if name is None:
         raise Exception('name is None!')
-    old = old.decode('hex')
-    new = hashlib.md5(('%s-%s' % (name, timestamp)).encode('utf_8')).digest()
-    response = ''.join(
-        map(chr, map(operator.xor, map(ord, old), map(ord, new))))
-    return response.encode('hex')
+    new = hashlib.md5(('%s-%s' % (name, timestamp)).encode('utf8')).hexdigest()
+    return '%032x' % (int(old, 16) ^ int(new, 16))
 
 
 def get_db_connection(path, timeout=30, okay_to_create=False):
diff --git a/test/unit/common/test_db.py b/test/unit/common/test_db.py
index ce9b1f4df7..e4e3843c9a 100644
--- a/test/unit/common/test_db.py
+++ b/test/unit/common/test_db.py
@@ -71,7 +71,7 @@ class TestChexor(unittest.TestCase):
             '4f2ea31ac14d4273fe32ba08062b21de')
 
     def test_invalid_old_hash(self):
-        self.assertRaises(TypeError, chexor, 'oldhash', 'name',
+        self.assertRaises(ValueError, chexor, 'oldhash', 'name',
                           normalize_timestamp(1))
 
     def test_no_name(self):