diff --git a/activesupport/lib/active_support/core_ext/string/output_safety.rb b/activesupport/lib/active_support/core_ext/string/output_safety.rb
index 36dd17cd8cc2b..430b2721ee557 100644
--- a/activesupport/lib/active_support/core_ext/string/output_safety.rb
+++ b/activesupport/lib/active_support/core_ext/string/output_safety.rb
@@ -20,7 +20,7 @@ def html_escape(s)
       if s.html_safe?
         s
       else
-        s.gsub(/[&"><]/) { |special| HTML_ESCAPE[special] }.html_safe
+        s.to_s.gsub(/&/, "&amp;").gsub(/\"/, "&quot;").gsub(/>/, "&gt;").gsub(/</, "&lt;").html_safe
       end
     end
 
diff --git a/activesupport/test/core_ext/string_ext_test.rb b/activesupport/test/core_ext/string_ext_test.rb
index 0360cf2901b18..0e483b1feb701 100644
--- a/activesupport/test/core_ext/string_ext_test.rb
+++ b/activesupport/test/core_ext/string_ext_test.rb
@@ -8,10 +8,17 @@
 require 'active_support/time'
 require 'active_support/core_ext/kernel/reporting'
 require 'active_support/core_ext/string/strip'
+require 'active_support/core_ext/string/output_safety'
 
 class StringInflectionsTest < Test::Unit::TestCase
   include InflectorTestCases
 
+  def test_erb_escape
+    string = [192, 60].pack('CC')
+    expected = 192.chr + "&lt;"
+    assert_equal expected, ERB::Util.html_escape(string)
+  end
+
   def test_strip_heredoc_on_an_empty_string
     assert_equal '', ''.strip_heredoc
   end