Malicious PDF — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 40b1d8689b589997…

MALICIOUS

PDF

45.5 KB Created: 2020-08-15 14:42:13 +03:00 Authoring application: wkhtmltopdf 0.12.5 (via Qt 4.8.7)
MD5: 2cc479fae621825752be04def7e8f304 SHA-1: 13f0c3881ccbb07cb5cdf8f3cea129b5d12bdb87 SHA-256: 40b1d8689b589997dcd421270ca36ee487cc2996a351f196a60325bf2640e8d8
130 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1566.002 Spearphishing Attachment T1204.002 Malicious Link

The PDF contains a mass external link farm, with one link pointing to a known malicious redirector. The document body, though heavily obfuscated, contains the text 'Apexogenesis journal pdf' and the malicious URL, suggesting a lure to trick users into downloading malicious content disguised as an academic paper. The presence of numerous Shopify-hosted PDF links further supports the SEO link farm heuristic.

Heuristics 4

  • PDF links to known malicious redirector infrastructure critical PDF_MALICIOUS_REDIRECTOR_LINK
    PDF contains a clickable URI to redirector infrastructure used by a known malicious PDF SEO/adware delivery campaign. These documents typically rely on user interaction and redirect chains rather than a PDF parser vulnerability.
  • Small PDF contains mass external PDF link farm critical PDF_SEO_LINK_FARM
    Small PDF contains many clickable external PDF links, mostly clustered on one host. This matches generated SEO/link-farm PDF carriers used to route users into malicious or unwanted-software delivery chains, rather than a normal document citation pattern.
  • Visual download / call-to-action button lure low SE_DOWNLOAD_BUTTON
    Document contains a call-to-action phrase ('Click here to download', 'Download Now', etc.) — low-signal unless other findings point to a malicious workflow
  • Embedded URL info EMBEDDED_URL
    One or more URLs were extracted from the document. The URL itself is not a detection — see the per-URL labels for which channel (macro, JS, link annotation, document body, ...) reached each URL.
    URL https://ttraff.cc/pify?keyword=apexogenesis+journal+pdf
    • http://files.writeworkstutoring.com/uploads/1/3/0/7/130739831/2180529.pdf
    • http://files.malvoncollies.com/uploads/1/3/1/4/131408581/xibapijudunewij.pdf
    • http://files.fragilebutunbroken.com/uploads/1/3/1/4/131406722/990179.pdf
    • http://files.smockadoo.com/uploads/1/3/1/4/131452804/8411613.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0434/7048/7702/files/44248501645.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0431/5188/4445/files/junefowagomimopijitusu.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0430/7143/9001/files/gutugebupetamovu.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0433/4498/6280/files/retail_sales_assistant_job_description.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0433/0687/7080/files/20880330559.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0440/8085/7253/files/alia_bhatt_songs_list_free.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0434/6616/2341/files/jawariguruwarosoxikoju.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0428/9835/8432/files/mujunevuduw.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0437/5583/1445/files/marupedalovubazugene.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0435/5879/7463/files/kexosararawivexonito.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0429/8627/4967/files/93656755240.pdf
    • https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0428/5900/4070/files/gapadodogorobese.pdf
    • http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#
    • http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/
    • http://ns.adobe.com/pdf/1.3/
    • http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/
    • http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/mm/
    • http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/rights/

Extracted artifacts 2

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
font_00_sfnt_off00007405.bin
ce6956e85ea03ffb09e41754e299a04b9ab9f6ae747147a0d611ad5b3d3f7fbe
pdf-font-stream PDF embedded font (sfnt) at offset 0x7405 5344 bytes
font_01_sfnt_off0000864c.bin
c8e9381eb454ce341572df6ec98073c65aacd18439d2a23ae5374d856ed82f67
pdf-font-stream PDF embedded font (sfnt) at offset 0x864C 10264 bytes