diff --git a/lib/core/option.py b/lib/core/option.py
index 3812cc5e7..50a191903 100644
--- a/lib/core/option.py
+++ b/lib/core/option.py
@@ -1183,7 +1183,10 @@ def __setKnowledgeBaseAttributes(flushAll=True):
     kb.osVersion       = None
     kb.osSP            = None
 
-    kb.pageEncoding    = None
+    # Default page encoding for HTML documents
+    # Reference: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ISO/IEC_8859-1
+    kb.pageEncoding    = 'iso-8859-1'
+
     kb.pageStable      = None
     kb.partRun         = None
     kb.proxyAuthHeader = None