Malicious RTF / .DOC — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 13e5b392701041a8…

MALICIOUS

RTF / .DOC

38.1 KB First seen: 2023-02-01
MD5: 62cceb9799df73395796b28182df6c4f SHA-1: 6f1739facbc6833add22d2537ed1e28493857f39 SHA-256: 13e5b392701041a85ebc009f8e5429febb56b6879b789c66351e6e4945ea82f0
220 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1204 Malicious Link T1204.002 Malicious Link: Malicious File T1059 Command and Scripting Interpreter T1059.005 Command and Scripting Interpreter: Visual Basic T1566 Phishing T1566.001 Phishing: Spearphishing Attachment T1566.002 Phishing: Spearphishing Link

The file is an RTF document containing an embedded OLE object that exploits the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability in Microsoft Equation Editor. This exploit is designed to execute arbitrary code, and the presence of the `SE_ENABLE_LURE` heuristic indicates the document likely contains instructions to trick the user into enabling editing or macros. The primary goal is to bypass security measures and execute a malicious payload.

Heuristics 6

  • Equation Editor activation — CVE-2017-11882 related high CVE related CVE_2017_11882_ACTIVATION_RELATED
    RTF decodes to an Equation.3 ProgID and requests OLE activation with \objemb plus \objupdate. This reaches the legacy Equation Editor attack surface used by CVE-2017-11882/CVE-2018-0802 documents, but the malformed MTEF/native payload needed for stronger attribution was not recovered.
  • Split hex Equation Editor ProgID + OLE object critical RTF_EQUATION_EDITOR
    RTF embeds the Equation.3 ProgID as hex bytes near OLE object activation and splits the byte stream with whitespace or an ignorable RTF group. This is an Equation Editor OLE activation surface commonly used by CVE-2017-11882 / CVE-2018-0802 exploit documents.
  • Automatically linked OLE object high RTF_OBJAUTLINK
    RTF contains \objautlink — an automatically linked OLE object surface that can be updated or activated when Word opens the document.
  • \objupdate forces OLE activation high RTF_OBJUPDATE
    RTF contains \objupdate — forces automatic OLE object instantiation when the document is opened, bypassing user interaction. Almost exclusively seen in Equation Editor exploit documents.
  • OLE object data medium RTF_OBJDATA
    RTF contains 1 \objdata section(s) — embedded OLE objects
  • Macro/content-enable lure medium SE_ENABLE_LURE
    Document instructs the user to enable macros or editing — a common technique used by malware droppers to bypass Office macro security settings

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
objdata_00_off000055da.bin
aefdb30aedb0570ea239c69e2824d5715999ce5e8e653daa3be016e65a4e59c9
rtf-objdata-decoded RTF \objdata at offset 0x55DA 1627 bytes