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

Static analysis result for SHA-256 1ee280cb4130d09c…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLSX

310.1 KB
MD5: f4d6c1f8616c2d921abe653049bf2b37 SHA-1: 41b4ede1e3f10a46b029a75cc472132ad1afae84 SHA-256: 1ee280cb4130d09c2739d4e89cfd0aaa3a2a996d86606e43d4d42e29ac73ca28
220 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1204.002 Malicious File T1559.001 Component Object Model Hijacking

The sample is an encrypted Office XLSX file. Static analysis identified an Equation Editor OLE object within the file, which is a known carrier for exploits. Specifically, the 'CVE_2018_0798_EQUATION_NATIVE_ANOMALY' heuristic indicates a vulnerability in the Equation Editor's native stream, likely used to deliver a malicious payload. The document's encryption and malformed structure further suggest it is designed to evade detection and deliver an exploit.

Heuristics 6

  • Equation Editor OLE object high CVE related OLE_EQUATION_EDITOR
    Default-encrypted OOXML embedded OLE object xl/embeddings/oleObject1.bin contains the Equation Editor CLSID, the legacy component exploited by CVE-2017-11882, CVE-2018-0802, and CVE-2018-0798.
  • CVE-2018-0798 — anomalous Equation Editor native stream high CVE likely CVE_2018_0798_EQUATION_NATIVE_ANOMALY
    Default-encrypted OOXML contains embedded Equation Editor data with anomalous native stream bytes consistent with a CVE-2018-0798-style exploit. This is treated as likely CVE evidence because the Equation object is malformed and payload-like.
  • Encrypted Office package with CFB FAT corruption critical OLE_ENCRYPTED_AND_MALFORMED
    Encrypted-package shape co-occurs with FAT-chain corruption — the documented combined evasion form.
  • Default-encrypted OOXML exploit carrier layout high OOXML_ENCRYPTED_EXPLOIT_CARRIER_SHAPE
    Default-password encrypted OOXML package contains embedded OLE object parts and additional activation/decoy parts. This layout is common in malicious Excel exploit delivery and requires inspecting the decrypted package.
  • Office document is password-encrypted medium OFFICE_ENCRYPTED_PACKAGE
    OLE container holds MS-OFFCRYPTO encrypted package (Standard Encryption (Office 2007, AES)).
  • Office OOXML encrypted with default VelvetSweatshop password medium OFFICE_DEFAULT_PASSWORD_ENCRYPTED_OOXML
    OLE EncryptedPackage decrypts with Excel's built-in VelvetSweatshop password. Office opens this transparently, and malware uses it to hide OOXML exploit parts from scanners that only inspect the outer OLE container.