MD5 encryption VB.NET

Public Function encryptData(ByVal data As String) As Byte()
        Dim md5Hasher As New System.Security.Cryptography.MD5CryptoServiceProvider()
        Dim hashedBytes As Byte()
        Dim encoder As New System.Text.UTF8Encoding()
        hashedBytes = md5Hasher.ComputeHash(encoder.GetBytes(data))
        Return hashedBytes
End Function

Public Function md5(ByVal data As String) As String
        Return BitConverter.ToString(encryptData(data)).Replace("-", "").ToLower()
End Function