diff --git a/includes/basetype.class.php b/includes/basetype.class.php
index 66802309..84eebb30 100644
--- a/includes/basetype.class.php
+++ b/includes/basetype.class.php
@@ -752,7 +752,7 @@ trait spawnHelper
 
 abstract class Filter
 {
-    private static  $pattern   = "/[^\p{L}0-9\s_\-\'\.\?\*]/ui";// delete any char not in unicode, number, space, underscore, hyphen, single quote, dot or common wildcard
+    private static  $pattern   = "/[\p{C}]/ui";             // delete unprintable characters
     private static  $wCards    = ['*' => '%', '?' => '_'];
     private static  $criteria  = ['cr', 'crs', 'crv'];      // [cr]iterium, [cr].[s]ign, [cr].[v]alue
 
diff --git a/includes/kernel.php b/includes/kernel.php
index 4918bb85..eb9d8c0a 100644
--- a/includes/kernel.php
+++ b/includes/kernel.php
@@ -96,7 +96,7 @@ foreach ($sets as $k => $v)
     else if ($v['flags'] & CON_FLAG_TYPE_BOOL)
         $val = (bool)$v['value'];
     else if ($v['flags'] & CON_FLAG_TYPE_STRING)
-        $val = preg_replace('/[^\p{L}0-9~\s_\-\'\/\.:,]/ui', '', $v['value']);
+        $val = preg_replace("/[\p{C}]/ui", '', $v['value']);
     else if ($php)
     {
         trigger_error('PHP config value '.strtolower($k).' has no type set - config will not be used!', E_USER_ERROR);