Malicious Office (OLE) — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 178a95cc8fe631e6…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE)

36.0 KB Created: 2020-11-27 11:46:46 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel
MD5: fc52a65a6d581d95d852f3d139dd9b1a SHA-1: 6ab7fd23123093f11da0375bf1e64ae2a9f11546 SHA-256: 178a95cc8fe631e616a9e6a4a04f5bbf9350a97e009e7069216b9f1fb45650cd
140 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.005 Visual Basic T1203 Exploitation for Client Execution

The file contains Excel 4.0 macros, specifically an Auto_Open entry, which is a critical finding. This indicates the macro sheet is designed to execute automatically upon opening the workbook. The presence of dangerous formula APIs like 'RUN' suggests the macro is intended to execute arbitrary code, likely downloading and running a second-stage payload. No specific family could be identified.

Heuristics 3

  • Excel 4.0 Auto_Open defined name critical OLE_XLM_AUTOOPEN_DEFINEDNAME
    oletools recovered an Auto_Open / Auto_Close entry from an Excel 4.0 macro sheet. The raw BIFF name can be tokenized or partially opaque to byte-string checks, but the recovered macro listing confirms the workbook has an XLM auto-execution entry.
  • XLM Auto_Open with dangerous formula APIs critical OLE_XLM_DANGEROUS_FN
    Excel 4.0 macro sheet contains an Auto_Open / Auto_Close entry and dangerous XLM formula APIs that can invoke programs, write files, or transfer control without VBA.
  • Excel 4.0 (XLM) macro sheet present medium OLE_XLM_AUTOOPEN
    Workbook contains an Excel 4.0 macro sheet sub-stream — XLM is rarely seen in modern legitimate workbooks and was a major Office malware vector during 2020-2022.

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
xlm_macros.txt
c2a64787d673606df7eceea3c561c9355121d4d7795a6a0ad1995fb83b4b7358		 xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 6819 bytes

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