Malicious Office (OLE) — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 8f8e4edf45a537fe…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE)

36.0 KB Created: 2020-11-25 10:43:12 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel
MD5: ebd2c9b466da4de22328c6c6cb87b008 SHA-1: e8da8e4b3e9f4eae0af89c63e0817d4022e55c64 SHA-256: 8f8e4edf45a537fecfcc167e283168d413500b4a1ff577e55def09a958818130
140 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.005 Visual Basic T1203 Exploitation for Client Execution

The file contains Excel 4.0 macros, specifically an Auto_Open defined name, which is a critical finding indicating automatic execution upon opening. The presence of dangerous formula APIs like RUN further suggests malicious intent. This points to a macro-based execution attack, likely designed to download and run a secondary payload.

Heuristics 3

  • 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.
  • 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
ddd7e90fc247770b841d5b46e6d5788f6e51d1f784ebfa493f0cddcf8de4d86f		 xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 6617 bytes

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