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

Static analysis result for SHA-256 202b66cbcf331785…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLS

455.0 KB Created: 2021-12-16 12:07:56 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel
MD5: 35fce0a2817b955eab7e19a96414b75a SHA-1: 11ad94e10c390a0f46dfa0834c74be736b183caa SHA-256: 202b66cbcf33178573685b3c9fd9bb8f248ce7be1bdb49845cbeb81c19577c8f
60 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.005 Visual Basic for Applications

The sample is an Excel 4.0 macro sheet that is encrypted, indicated by the OLE_XLM_ENCRYPTED_MACROSHEET heuristic. This is a common method for hiding malicious code within documents. The OLE_XLM_AUTOOPEN heuristic further suggests that the macro sheet is designed to execute automatically upon opening the file. No specific IOCs were extracted, and the document body was unreadable.

Heuristics 2

  • Encrypted Excel 4.0 macro sheet high OLE_XLM_ENCRYPTED_MACROSHEET
    Workbook contains an Excel 4.0 macro sheet and BIFF FILEPASS encryption. Password-protected XLM macro sheets, especially the default Excel password path, are a common malware evasion pattern because static formula extraction may fail until the workbook is decrypted.
  • 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.