diff --git a/wolfssl/internal.h b/wolfssl/internal.h
index 35bfa4685c..4988a378a5 100644
--- a/wolfssl/internal.h
+++ b/wolfssl/internal.h
@@ -2504,7 +2504,7 @@ struct CRL_Entry {
     /* DupCRL_Entry copies data after the `verifyMutex` member. Using the mutex
      * as the marker because clang-tidy doesn't like taking the sizeof a
      * pointer. */
-    byte    crlNumber[CRL_MAX_NUM_HEX_STR_SZ];    /* CRL number extension */
+    char    crlNumber[CRL_MAX_NUM_HEX_STR_SZ];    /* CRL number extension */
     byte    issuerHash[CRL_DIGEST_SIZE];  /* issuer hash                 */
     /* byte    crlHash[CRL_DIGEST_SIZE];      raw crl data hash           */
     /* restore the hash here if needed for optimized comparisons */