Emotet — Office (OLE) / .XLS malware analysis

Static analysis result for SHA-256 76323e3a53815b76…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLS

217.0 KB Created: 2015-06-05 18:19:34 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel First seen: 2022-11-03
MD5: 65d9d5c0a65355b62f967c57fa830348 SHA-1: e2defe35a68a0a8374fab7f7ec019b5b54a8a346 SHA-256: 76323e3a53815b76193d22984da10a9d492d934d49a611fd541e7a78a88cf3c9
200 Risk Score

Malware Insights

Emotet · confidence 95%

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.005 Service Execution: Visual Basic T1566.001 Phishing: Spearphishing Attachment

The file contains Excel 4.0 macros, specifically an Auto_Open function, which is a known technique for executing malicious code. ClamAV identified this as Emotet, a downloader family. The macro's use of dangerous formula APIs like RUN indicates it is designed to execute arbitrary code, likely to download and run a second-stage payload.

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-b649c93692b4c9d9-9976616-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-b649c93692b4c9d9-9976616-0
  • 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
c3104f10e8e1ef5231236e92e70adacf54cb2c7645898349147783c4e6e87dc2		 xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 8259 bytes

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