Emotet — Office (OLE) / .XLS malware analysis

Static analysis result for SHA-256 2d3ada62fb280a9c…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLS

114.4 KB Created: 2022-01-24 01:40:11 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel
MD5: 7d6dce86506b7fbacb296d16d2d61889 SHA-1: f1e3c1c4ef83b97aa37eb23e859846e3a32c6d67 SHA-256: 2d3ada62fb280a9c911b06c55456d267802883567fe778265ec34a0f0c958e3f
200 Risk Score

Malware Insights

Emotet · confidence 95%

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.005 Visual Basic T1059.001 PowerShell T1566.001 Spearphishing Attachment

The file is identified as malicious by ClamAV and exhibits critical heuristic firings indicating the presence of Excel 4.0 macros with an Auto_Open entry. These macros are known to be used for downloading and executing second-stage payloads. The ClamAV detection name 'Xls.Downloader.Emotet-bd646319c2d29cd6-9951195-0' strongly suggests the Emotet family, which commonly uses macro-enabled documents for initial infection. The document body content appears to be a generic time card, likely a lure.

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-bd646319c2d29cd6-9951195-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-bd646319c2d29cd6-9951195-0
  • 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
86637063ac2c97bbefdbc9033f21cd30e9484ed274aba63ad50d62dfa1de93cd
xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 4341 bytes