Malicious PDF — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 856abbf8db6dae55…

MALICIOUS

PDF

9.1 KB First seen: 2026-05-08
MD5: 7ed8e9cfb9405938826e772700c3d76a SHA-1: 37a156a5c05ee31dce0af457e28cfdba0c612a39 SHA-256: 856abbf8db6dae5546b5520e0772a2a22ee3991f540986d36c27cc69b071d60a
138 Risk Score

Malware Insights

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

The critical heuristic firing for CVE-2010-0188 indicates that this PDF exploits a known vulnerability in Adobe Reader's handling of XFA forms. The embedded script payload and malformed stream length further support the exploitation of this vulnerability. The primary goal appears to be the execution of arbitrary code, likely to download and run a secondary payload, which is a common tactic for initial compromise.

Machine Learning

  • Nyx PDF Classifier malicious score 1.0000

Heuristics 7

  • Adobe Reader LibTIFF XFA image exploit — CVE-2010-0188 critical CVE likely CVE_2010_0188
    PDF contains the CVE-2010-0188 exploit template: XFA JavaScript heap-spray setup, a generated TIFF image payload, and assignment of that TIFF data to an XFA image field rawValue to trigger Adobe Reader's LibTIFF parser.
  • Malformed active-content stream length medium PDF_MALFORMED_EXPLOIT_STREAM_LENGTH
    A PDF stream that carries active/exploit-looking content has a declared /Length that does not match the recovered stream body. Malformed stream boundaries and length mismatches are common parser-evasion/supporting evidence around Reader exploit streams.
  • 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
  • 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
  • Embedded script payload in PDF stream info 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.
  • 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.xfa.org/schema/xfa-locale-set/2.1/ In PDF document text
    • http://ns.adobe.com/xdp/In PDF document text
    • http://www.xfa.org/schema/xci/1.0/In PDF document text
    • http://www.xfa.org/schema/xfa-data/1.0/In PDF document text

Extracted artifacts 5

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
embedded_file_obj0041.bin pdf-embedded-file PDF EmbeddedFile object 41 at offset 0xCF3 85 bytes
SHA-256: c06dcd026a7ea0536b63e07ce688691b585339a3ab7ff59065e546b56308c7bb
embedded_file_obj0042.bin pdf-embedded-file PDF EmbeddedFile object 42 at offset 0xDA5 1029 bytes
SHA-256: dda0835df994b8be920f715db36452f6cee7bb42bbc9c897f878a7b298ba8e91
embedded_file_obj0111.bin pdf-embedded-file PDF EmbeddedFile object 111 at offset 0xFBF 56804 bytes
SHA-256: 5b8bd30f5a19a851828504e9091dfaad081b1a6d221f1e8f8683d44ef0203ed6
embedded_file_obj0044.bin pdf-embedded-file PDF EmbeddedFile object 44 at offset 0x1F03 144 bytes
SHA-256: 3dd68f00f4fcb366a2a3a17c65cb2626eeddf5ea5713302d374310561d810169
embedded_file_obj0045.bin pdf-embedded-file PDF EmbeddedFile object 45 at offset 0x1FB0 77 bytes
SHA-256: 10c03f88a5f0a0833dc5b2c8ac295b3a3c6f65e23889eb8cc1dc6fe29bf7f275

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