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

Static analysis result for SHA-256 65f352840f8f712f…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLS

960.5 KB Created: 2020-06-30 14:47:25 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel
MD5: 7d4b4e35f0012a5cd4cf133e46825438 SHA-1: d7b33febe01cd4f57de1faf08e5681765061b369 SHA-256: 65f352840f8f712f315a6f785f51789eaab2f0a0215ae8db78683c80975733c4
160 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1566.001 Spearphishing Attachment T1059.005 Visual Basic T1140 Deobfuscate/Decode Files or Information

The sample is an Excel 4.0 macro sheet (XLM) that contains an Auto_Open macro, a common technique for executing malicious code upon opening the document. The document body displays a lure to enable editing and content, citing CloudFlare, to bypass security measures. The XLM macro sheet also includes environment evasion techniques, suggesting an attempt to hinder analysis.

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 environment-evasion close gate critical OLE_XLM_ENVIRONMENT_EVASION_CLOSE
    Excel 4.0 macro sheet auto-executes environment checks with GET.WORKSPACE / GET.WINDOW, then shows a fake corruption/error message and closes the workbook when the host fails those checks. This is a malware sandbox-evasion pattern, even when the later payload stage is hidden behind obfuscated defined-name flow.
  • 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
59d54c8e9975a1de40532ad0a112882008506f73ad75f43639ca850a983907b4		 xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 110209 bytes

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