Malicious Office (OLE) / .XLSX — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 021dc4584266897e…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLSX

776.0 KB Created: 2006-09-16 00:00:00 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel First seen: 2023-07-27
MD5: 74468f20f8ee594f9edc6545ee41e5cc SHA-1: 26d63ef44cb1b9c7d24d65949db116bbed2bfced SHA-256: 021dc4584266897e41b704b4f41c5f5b45ad119588be8ae75b3285f85b86ce9e
134 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1204.002 Malicious File T1059.005 Visual Basic

The sample leverages the CVE-2017-0199 vulnerability, which is indicated by the OLE2Link/URL Moniker heuristic firing. This vulnerability allows the exploitation of URL Monikers to download and execute remote content. The embedded URL, http://192.3.216.144/650/SWISS/SWISSSWISSSWISSSIWSSSIWISSSWISS%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23SWISSSWISSWISWISWIS%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23swisswisssiswissiswiss.dOC, is the likely source of the secondary payload. The presence of multiple embedded PDF objects with suspicious static findings further supports a multi-stage attack.

Heuristics 6

  • OLE2Link / URL Moniker → remote loader — CVE-2017-0199 critical CVE likely CVE_2017_0199
    Document contains an embedded OLE link object whose URL Moniker points to a remote URL. When the host file is opened, Office follows the link, downloads the URL, and processes the response based on its Content-Type (HTA -> mshta.exe, RTF → Word, etc.) — the documented CVE-2017-0199 primitive. The URL extension is not a reliable filter; servers can return different payloads to Office's user agent.
  • Secondary embedded PDF body has suspicious static findings critical POLYGLOT_CHILD_PDF_STATIC_TRIAGE
    A valid PDF body was found at a nonzero offset inside another container and its carved contents matched PDF exploit or lure heuristics. This catches polyglots where the top-level magic routes to ZIP/OLE while a PDF reader or downstream parser opens the hidden PDF payload.
  • VBA project contains no executable statements low OLE_VBA_MACROS
    Document contains a VBA project, but extracted modules only contain attributes/options/comments and no executable statements.
  • PDF paints image(s) but contains no text operators info PDF_IMAGE_ONLY_LURE
    PDF has 2 image XObject(s) and the content stream contains no text-emitting operators (BT/ET, Tj, TJ, ', ") in either raw bytes or decompressed streams — this is the screenshot-as-PDF pattern used to bypass text-based scanners and to deliver instructions purely through rendered pixels. It is informational unless paired with invisible links or risky URI context.
  • Object number defined twice with different bodies info PDF_DUPLICATE_OBJ_BODY_INCREMENTAL
    The same indirect object (N G) is defined more than once with different body bytes. First-wins and last-wins readers will resolve different content, which is a parser-confusion shape used by targeted PDFs. Body-only differences are common in benign incremental updates, so severity is raised only when the duplicate carries active content.
  • Embedded URL info EMBEDDED_URL
    One or more URLs were extracted from the document. The URL itself is not a detection — see the per-URL labels for which channel (macro, JS, link annotation, document body, ...) reached each URL.
    URL http://192.3.216.144/650/SWISS/SWISSSWISSSWISSSWISSSIWSSSIWISSSWISS%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23SWISSSWISSWISWISWIS%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23%23swisswisssiswissiswiss.dOC
    • http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#
    • http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/
    • http://ns.adobe.com/pdf/1.3/
    • http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/
    • http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/mm/

Extracted artifacts 5

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
macros.bas
7f506327609c082af1cd37dde23bc2c71a000f7d1ef530b6abb66775040a7673		 vba-macro oletools.olevba.extract_macros (decoded VBA source) 1206 bytes
polyglot_child_pdf_off00000e00.pdf
d439df8ab7d1dee4131b246c5f97dc0825b0065cac92718f2f2a4b706a9c16e7		 polyglot-child-pdf Secondary PDF body inside ole container at offset 0xE00 791040 bytes
polyglot_child_pdf_off00004000.pdf
ef06177164000d67fa9cb6e0c3e8303d028a477e3e8e579ca5becca2a1d721c3		 polyglot-child-pdf Secondary PDF body inside ole container at offset 0x4000 778240 bytes
polyglot_child_pdf_off00006400.pdf
7ec155fc4c936435dfbd304624cf586eec4d10d0fc91a47fc06510f4c8998993		 polyglot-child-pdf Secondary PDF body inside ole container at offset 0x6400 769024 bytes
polyglot_child_pdf_off00016200.pdf
67057d56920e8000af4c485e91d8c84d3acb094697dfc3e7395cb42d221457ed		 polyglot-child-pdf Secondary PDF body inside ole container at offset 0x16200 704000 bytes

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