Emotet — Office (OOXML) / .XLSX malware analysis

Static analysis result for SHA-256 35ac20a34ac42103…

MALICIOUS

Office (OOXML) / .XLSX

115.1 KB Created: 2015-06-05 18:17:20 UTC Authoring application: Microsoft Excel 12.0000
MD5: 600af4e468b5bd4be16b5cc079e7b9f5 SHA-1: 5fb4c7b8912b3cefed8be5ff48d4c6a0c14d9b77 SHA-256: 35ac20a34ac4210328034670529dc32e7691aef3f3799d0e08fab497d0aa8e39
200 Risk Score

Malware Insights

Emotet · confidence 95%

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.001 PowerShell T1566.002 Spearphishing with Malicious Attachment T1059.005 Visual Basic

The file is identified as malicious by ClamAV with the signature 'Xls.Downloader.EmotetExcel02223-9938902-0', strongly suggesting the Emotet family. The presence of a Workbook_Open macro and CreateObject calls indicates automated execution upon opening. The embedded VBA script contains heavily obfuscated PowerShell commands, including a reconstructed URL: 'http://sumedahonline.com/wp-content/hEyNXJ300XQVBSRH/', which is likely used to download and execute a second-stage payload. Additionally, the script attempts to create batch and VBScript files in the programdata directory.

Heuristics 5

  • ClamAV: Xls.Downloader.EmotetExcel02223-9938902-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Xls.Downloader.EmotetExcel02223-9938902-0
  • Workbook_Open macro high OLE_VBA_WBOPEN
    Workbook_Open macro
  • CreateObject call high OLE_VBA_CREATEOBJ
    CreateObject call
  • Suspicious extracted artifact high EXTRACTED_FILE_STATIC_TRIAGE
    One or more files extracted from inside this sample matched static suspicious-content checks such as script obfuscation, encoded payload blobs, packed data, or execution/download terms.
  • VBA project inside OOXML medium OOXML_VBA
    Document contains vbaProject.bin — VBA macros present

Extracted artifacts 2

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
macros.bas
df1eb14c222394595c0518b49eec2b55ed9573146c5f1717dedceddd2e199a2b
vba-macro oletools.olevba.extract_macros (decoded VBA source from OOXML) 12041 bytes
Detection
ClamAV: No threats found
Obfuscation or payload: likely
Carved macro source contains an auto-exec entry point and execution/download terms.
vbaProject_00.bin
9a52efaec91414b4f1e6002951e75875845a82387f091b309fa83964d0b261ca
vba-project OOXML VBA project: xl/vbaProject.bin 42496 bytes
Detection
ClamAV: No threats found
Obfuscation or payload: likely
Carved macro source contains an auto-exec entry point and execution/download terms.