diff --git a/homeassistant/observers.py b/homeassistant/observers.py
index 353aad1c7b0..17000ed7bc0 100644
--- a/homeassistant/observers.py
+++ b/homeassistant/observers.py
@@ -278,10 +278,8 @@ class DeviceTracker(object):
 
                             # Make sure that each device is mapped
                             # to a unique category name
-                            name = row['name']
-
-                            if not name:
-                                name = "unnamed_device"
+                            name = util.slugify(row['name']) if row['name'] \
+                                else "unnamed_device"
 
                             tries = 0
                             suffix = ""
diff --git a/homeassistant/util.py b/homeassistant/util.py
index 102f01a10aa..a27032aa72e 100644
--- a/homeassistant/util.py
+++ b/homeassistant/util.py
@@ -2,7 +2,17 @@
 
 import re
 
+RE_SANITIZE_FILENAME = re.compile(r"(~|(\.\.)|/|\+)")
+RE_SLUGIFY = re.compile(r'[^A-Za-z0-9_]+')
+
 
 def sanitize_filename(filename):
     """ Sanitizes a filename by removing .. / and \\. """
-    return re.sub(r"(~|(\.\.)|/|\+)", "", filename)
+    return RE_SANITIZE_FILENAME.sub("", filename)
+
+
+def slugify(text):
+    """ Slugifies a given text. """
+    text = text.strip().replace(" ", "_")
+
+    return RE_SLUGIFY.sub("", text)