diff --git a/NEWS b/NEWS
index 340115ecc..5302c1ccd 100644
--- a/NEWS
+++ b/NEWS
@@ -23,6 +23,12 @@ GNU coreutils NEWS                                    -*- outline -*-
   'date --date' now parses dot delimited dd.mm.yy format common in Europe.
   This is in addition to the already supported mm/dd/yy and yy-mm-dd formats.
 
+** Changes in behavior
+
+  'cksum --check' now uses shell quoting when required, to more robustly
+  escape file names output in diagnostics.
+  This also affects md5sum, sha*sum, and b2sum.
+
 ** Improvements
 
   'df --local' recognises more file system types as remote.
diff --git a/doc/coreutils.texi b/doc/coreutils.texi
index f3d8c81ca..c9b67c339 100644
--- a/doc/coreutils.texi
+++ b/doc/coreutils.texi
@@ -4130,7 +4130,11 @@ By default, for each valid line, one line is written to standard
 output indicating whether the named file passed the test.
 After all checks have been performed, if there were any failures,
 a warning is issued to standard error.
-Use the @option{--status} option to inhibit that output.
+If file names contain problematic characters,
+they will be quoted in a way suitable for POSIX-compatible shells,
+so that any file name is represented unambiguously and safely.
+
+Use the @option{--status} option to inhibit the output described above.
 If any listed file cannot be opened or read, if any valid line has
 a checksum inconsistent with the associated file, or if no valid
 line is found, @command{cksum} exits with nonzero status.  Otherwise,
diff --git a/src/cksum.c b/src/cksum.c
index 14119c6a1..8bc83cf93 100644
--- a/src/cksum.c
+++ b/src/cksum.c
@@ -705,6 +705,7 @@ or equivalent standalone program.\
   exit (status);
 }
 
+#if !HASH_ALGO_SUM
 /* Given a string S, return TRUE if it contains problematic characters
    that need escaping.  Note we escape '\' itself to provide some forward
    compat to introduce escaping of other characters.  */
@@ -716,6 +717,7 @@ problematic_chars (char const *s)
   idx_t length = strcspn (s, "\\\n\r");
   return s[length] != '\0';
 }
+#endif
 
 /* Given a file name, S of length S_LEN, that is not NUL-terminated,
    modify it in place, performing the equivalent of this sed substitution:
@@ -1128,6 +1130,7 @@ split_3 (char *s, idx_t s_len,
   return true;
 }
 
+#if !HASH_ALGO_SUM
 /* If ESCAPE is true, then translate each:
    NEWLINE byte to the string, "\\n",
    CARRIAGE RETURN byte to the string, "\\r",
@@ -1164,6 +1167,7 @@ print_filename (char const *file, bool escape)
       file++;
     }
 }
+#endif
 
 /* An interface to the function, DIGEST_STREAM.
    Operate on FILENAME (it may be "-").
@@ -1444,7 +1448,6 @@ digest_check (char const *checkfile_name)
         {
           bool ok;
           bool missing;
-          bool needs_escape = ! status_only && problematic_chars (filename);
 
           properly_formatted_lines = true;
 
@@ -1455,12 +1458,7 @@ digest_check (char const *checkfile_name)
             {
               ++n_open_or_read_failures;
               if (!status_only)
-                {
-                  if (needs_escape)
-                    putchar ('\\');
-                  print_filename (filename, needs_escape);
-                  printf (": %s\n", _("FAILED open or read"));
-                }
+                printf ("%s: %s\n", quotef (filename),_("FAILED open or read"));
             }
           else if (ignore_missing && missing)
             {
@@ -1486,11 +1484,7 @@ digest_check (char const *checkfile_name)
               if (!status_only)
                 {
                   if (! match || ! quiet)
-                    {
-                      if (needs_escape)
-                        putchar ('\\');
-                      print_filename (filename, needs_escape);
-                    }
+                    fputs (quotef (filename), stdout);
 
                   if (! match)
                     printf (": %s\n", _("FAILED"));
diff --git a/tests/cksum/md5sum-bsd.sh b/tests/cksum/md5sum-bsd.sh
index 7f526bf00..7859fbbf5 100755
--- a/tests/cksum/md5sum-bsd.sh
+++ b/tests/cksum/md5sum-bsd.sh
@@ -82,8 +82,8 @@ if echo '' > 'backslash\is\not\dir\sep'; then
     md5sum --tag "$i" >> check.md5 || fail=1
   done
   md5sum --strict -c check.md5 > out || fail=1
-  printf '%s: OK\n' '\a\\b' '\a\\' '\\\a' '\a\nb' "a${t}b" > exp ||
-    framework_failure_
+  printf '%s: OK\n' "'a\\b'" "'a\\'" "'\\a'" \
+                    "'a'\$'\\n''b'" "'a'\$'\\t''b'" > exp || framework_failure_
   compare exp out || fail=1