Office (OOXML) / .XLSM malware analysis — malicious · 492a8edc4386bc21

MALICIOUS

Office (OOXML) / .XLSM

57.7 KB Created: 2021-02-03 15:28:44 UTC Authoring application: Microsoft Excel 16.0300

MD5: a3df654767610cdd5ef6d8420c773ede SHA-1: 99c2321e718c6bec68fd11da84f9d7bfa7f4b4bc SHA-256: 492a8edc4386bc2194553a437c001e078bf64a90487b1896cfaccb9abfa22c01

268 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK

T1059.005 Visual Basic for Applications T1059.001 PowerShell T1105 Ingress Tool Transfer

The file is an Excel macro-enabled spreadsheet (XLSM) containing Excel 4.0 macros. Critical heuristics indicate the use of dangerous XLM formula APIs like CALL and EXEC, along with Win32 API strings such as CreateDirectoryA and Kernel32. The embedded document body contains a URL and a file path, strongly suggesting the macro's intent is to download and execute a second-stage payload. The use of these low-level functions points to a downloader or droppper functionality.

Heuristics 7

Excel 4.0 macro sheet (1 sheet(s)) critical OOXML_XLM_MACROSHEET

Spreadsheet contains an Excel 4.0 (XLM) macro sheet — XLM was a major Office malware vector during 2020-2022 and evaded many VBA-focused controls before Microsoft tightened XLM defaults. Even legitimate XLM use is rare in modern workbooks.
Excel 4.0 Auto_Open defined name critical OOXML_XLM_AUTOOPEN_DEFINEDNAME

Workbook defines _xlnm.Auto_Open or _xlnm.Auto_Close while containing an XLM macro sheet. This is the OOXML/XLSB auto-execution shape for Excel 4.0 macros.
Dangerous XLM formula APIs: CALL, EXEC, HALT critical OOXML_XLM_DANGEROUS_FN

Excel 4.0 macro sheet uses formula APIs that call directly into Win32 (=CALL/=EXEC/=REGISTER/=FORMULA). These are the primitives used to download payloads, write files, and start processes from an XLM macro without invoking VBA.
Binary XLM macro sheet with WinAPI/download strings critical OOXML_XLM_BINARY_WINAPI_STRINGS

Excel 4.0 macro sheet is stored as BIFF12/XLSB binary data and contains Win32 download or process-execution API strings such as URLDownloadToFileA, ShellExecuteA, or CreateDirectoryA. These strings are high-signal in XLM macro sheets and catch payload-download macros that XML-formula scanners cannot parse.
Suspicious extracted artifact medium 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.
Hidden worksheet (hidden) low OOXML_HIDDEN_SHEET

Excel workbook contains 1 hidden sheet(s) — hidden sheets are commonly used to conceal macro code, staging data, or intermediate payload construction
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 http://xgka03stox03cloeqz.com/index.gif
- http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/spreadsheetml/2006/main
- http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/excel/2006/main
- http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/officeDocument/2006/relationships
- http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006
- http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/spreadsheetml/2009/9/ac
- http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/spreadsheetml/2014/revision
- http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/spreadsheetml/2015/revision2
- http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/spreadsheetml/2016/revision3
- http://schemas.microsoft.com/office/spreadsheetml/2016/revision6

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

Filename	Kind	Source	Size
`xlm_sheet_00.xml` `7010459773723523e80e296d43dc8ceb6ad9590584eb96105e04254b08161c3f`	xlm-macrosheet	OOXML XLM macro sheet: xl/macrosheets/sheet1.xml	148206 bytes
Detection ClamAV: No threats found Obfuscation or payload: likely Carved artifact contains 1 shell/COM execution token(s).

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