Emotet — Office (OLE) / .XLSX malware analysis

Static analysis result for SHA-256 197651ad3ab7de21…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLSX

79.0 KB Created: 2015-06-05 18:19:34 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel First seen: 2022-05-18
MD5: 51124ee2d7acd0c79a5211e3dee17507 SHA-1: d5a377b8900de0201dc61a584b1ebfaf0f7cb9a2 SHA-256: 197651ad3ab7de21f409bc7fd5560428148de7553a4e8978c723f9208ea74d25
200 Risk Score

Malware Insights

Emotet · confidence 95%

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 known technique for executing malicious code. The macros attempt to construct and download a payload from multiple URLs, including 'https://thepublicelection.com/wp-includes/0AEt8wRWr oI JmVgEjZC/'. This behavior is characteristic of downloader malware, and the ClamAV signature points to Emotet.

Heuristics 4

  • 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.
  • ClamAV: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-ea85857e7e81817a-9950241-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-ea85857e7e81817a-9950241-0
  • 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
9adf99aa959e452d549d1e4979c57edf0d871284640bacfef310bdb0044249bc		 xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 7262 bytes

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