Emotet — Office (OLE) / .XLS malware analysis

Static analysis result for SHA-256 5553171d17e4edc7…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLS

53.5 KB Created: 2015-06-05 18:19:34 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel First seen: 2022-06-21
MD5: c868887795d71313185169ed7f7a6ba5 SHA-1: 8dc05a7bad05a0247c80b1aa17dfab394b89c54a SHA-256: 5553171d17e4edc74b4863d3ca638a60242302daec3c744dc887d64f35557227
200 Risk Score

Malware Insights

Emotet · confidence 95%

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.005 Visual Basic T1204.002 Malicious File

The file contains Excel 4.0 macros, specifically an Auto_Open function, which is a known technique for executing malicious code. The macro is designed to download and execute a second-stage payload from one of the provided URLs. ClamAV detection further confirms this as Emotet. The reconstructed URLs are: http://colorsdrop.com/7DORfidiAu/BquoS/U/, https://ewingconsulting.com/buy/Ewj7oYjhYQ/, https://ceramiclafortaleza.com/css/5DSBCCH0/, and http://thuybaohuy.com/wp-content/VxhkYwH7/.

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: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-aa87d5786a858772-9953435-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-aa87d5786a858772-9953435-0
  • 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
7ab5ef6689937532951c996fe211a2ac046a3dbc546728bfe725212729605929		 xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 6790 bytes

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