Emotet — Office (OLE) / .XLS malware analysis

Static analysis result for SHA-256 472b2959166c5ce4…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLS

51.0 KB Created: 2022-03-31 18:59:29 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel First seen: 2022-04-01
MD5: aba0e375179b7876ef9d3ce4032df858 SHA-1: e05ca3f6985d387e5b20685246e9f763f3350c8a SHA-256: 472b2959166c5ce48fb19523113634e446956d78b5c8dd4083f4961e9b4345e2
200 Risk Score

Malware Insights

Emotet · confidence 95%

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.005 Visual Basic T1204.002 Malicious File T1059.001 PowerShell T1105 Ingress Tool Transfer

The file contains Excel 4.0 macros, specifically an Auto_Open macro, which is a known technique for executing malicious code. The macros are designed to download and execute a payload using regsvr32.exe from one of the provided URLs. The ClamAV detection and the nature of the macros strongly indicate the Emotet family, a known downloader.

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: Doc.Downloader.Emotet04220-9942582-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Doc.Downloader.Emotet04220-9942582-0
  • 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
a11367f9198d389edc339eb9ce41c37a00a51e587b88587a6a6cdabbd071018a
xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 7319 bytes