CCTK 4.6.0 Asset Tag contains null characters

Heads up about a problem with, or please explain this undocumented feature that's not in release notes. Command Configure (4.6.0.277, A00) and the cctk contained there-in, v 4.6.0.0; this sets the asset tag in to contain additional null characters, 6 by my testing. This behaviour is not present in cctk 4.5.0.0. This messed up a bit of logic in testing existing asset tags against task sequence variables used in MECM OSD and we've reverted to using the previous version of cctk to work around this.

E.g. with 4.6.0;
cctk.exe --Asset=12345 --ValSetupPwd=UEFIpw
restart
Powershell: $foo = gcim Win32_SystemEnclosure | select -expandproperty SMBIOSAssetTag
$foo: returns 12345
$foo.length: returns 11
*6 extra null characters

$bar = & .\cctk.exe –Asset
$bar: returns Asset=12345
$bar.length: returns 17
*6 extra null characters

Do the above with cctk v4.5.0.0;
$foo: returns 12345
$foo.length: returns 5
$bar: returns Asset=12345
$bar.length: returns 11
*Being correct as ‘Asset=12345’

Is this an intended feature of cctk 4.6? If so, why has this been implemented and why was it not in the release notes? If it’s not an intended feature, could we please be advised as we’ll have to account for (remove) the null characters in logic.