Malicious PDF — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 5dcc9e7144ebcf8c…

MALICIOUS

PDF

52.9 KB Created: 2017-11-13 00:19:48 +01:00
MD5: 2200a0aeeb27aaca8564f8c70fc0df6a SHA-1: 234a6b6a7475cd33ce7a379a4b178b1de66aa3b1 SHA-256: 5dcc9e7144ebcf8cc3ac4c12594024652acc42f433caaf7e5ad2ba18aab99f37
190 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.007 JavaScript T1203 Exploitation for Client Execution T1566.001 Spearphishing Attachment

The PDF contains embedded JavaScript that utilizes eval() and String.fromCharCode, indicating an attempt to execute malicious code. The script concatenates words from pages 2 through 4 of the document and then evaluates the resulting string, which is a common obfuscation technique for downloading and executing further payloads. The presence of PDF_JS_EXPLOIT_CLUSTER and ML_NYX_PDF_MALICIOUS heuristics further supports this assessment.

Machine Learning

  • Nyx PDF Classifier malicious score 0.9918

Heuristics 11

  • PDF JavaScript exploit cluster critical PDF_JS_EXPLOIT_CLUSTER
    PDF combines an executable JavaScript/action surface with exploit staging indicators such as eval/unescape/fromCharCode, XFA script content, or a related CVE pattern. Benign form JavaScript remains low-severity, but this correlated cluster is high-confidence malicious behavior.
  • eval() call high PDF_EVAL
    eval() found — commonly used for obfuscated exploit execution (matched inside decoded stream)
  • JavaScript action low PDF_JAVASCRIPT
    PDF contains a /JavaScript action. Generic JavaScript is common in benign forms; specific dangerous APIs are scored by separate rules.
  • Embedded JS stream low PDF_JS
    PDF references a /JS stream. Generic JavaScript is common in benign forms; specific dangerous APIs are scored by separate rules.
  • Embedded file low PDF_EMBEDDED
    PDF embeds a file attachment — could carry an executable or another weaponised document as a nested payload
  • XFA form low PDF_XFA
    PDF uses XML Forms Architecture — can contain script logic
  • String.fromCharCode low PDF_FROMCHARCODE
    String.fromCharCode found — used to construct payload strings dynamically. Common in benign JavaScript libraries for codepoint manipulation, so this alone is informational; weaponised use is also caught by the dedicated fromCharCode-stage and exploit-shape rules. (matched inside decoded stream)
  • Embedded script payload in PDF stream low PDF_EMBEDDED_SCRIPT_PAYLOAD
    PDF stream bytes contain an HTML/XFA <script> tag without accompanying Windows shell-execution primitives — common in accessible XFA forms but worth surfacing for analyst review.
  • AcroForm button with action trigger low PDF_ACROFORM_BUTTON
    PDF contains a /Btn form field together with a SubmitForm/URI/Launch/JS trigger — this is the building block of fake 'Download' or 'Open' button overlays used in PDF phishing lures
  • Suspicious extracted artifact info 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.
  • 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://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#
    • http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/
    • http://ns.adobe.com/xap/1.0/mm/
    • http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/
    • http://ns.adobe.com/xdp/
    • http://www.xfa.org/schema/xci/3.0/
    • http://www.xfa.org/schema/xfa-template/3.0/
    • http://www.xfa.org/schema/xfa-data/1.0/
    • http://www.xfa.org/schema/xfa-form/2.8/

Extracted artifacts 2

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
embedded_file_obj0029.bin
ddb2f0273ff53a78cba698afed0c23add8e219eaa85fecd99611493bebdb4d27
pdf-embedded-file PDF EmbeddedFile object 29 at offset 0xC701 1237 bytes
javascript_obj0001_000.js
fa64b4b18bae88a35a311c66e2da3b8e533af452982f59d90014b76eec69b141
pdf-javascript-stream PDF /JS object 1 at offset 0x3EE 210 bytes
Detection
ClamAV: No threats found
Obfuscation or payload: likely
Carved artifact contains 1 eval/decoder/string-building token(s).