Malicious Office (OLE) / .XLS — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 53bf439b45ca55f7…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLS

65.9 KB Created: 2022-01-17 17:40:35 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel
MD5: e8cfd6ccd67cfea70d369b3e99af6aa4 SHA-1: 1521fec9aa1e192984a3321a0a5bfe6d37e1d9dc SHA-256: 53bf439b45ca55f7669435aa94c6e484fb484b1580a18bd92b03b6d16d87a038
100 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.005 Service Execution: Visual Basic T1204.002 Malicious Link: Malicious File

The sample is an Excel 4.0 macro-enabled spreadsheet. It contains an Auto_Open macro that executes a command to download a payload from the reconstructed URL 'http://0xc12a24f5/cc.html'. The document also contains a lure to enable content, which is a common tactic for macro-based malware delivery.

Heuristics 3

  • 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.
  • 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.
  • Macro/content-enable lure medium SE_ENABLE_LURE
    Document instructs the user to enable macros or editing — a common technique used by malware droppers to bypass Office macro security settings

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
xlm_macros.txt
0807f652a36752efcd354ce3c536f2fe7ed4cd53a3ff1787c33acb378dda90a0
xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 1073 bytes