Malicious PDF — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 90140dd9c7294af6…

MALICIOUS

PDF

9.3 KB First seen: 2026-05-08
MD5: 2ec5a8860ed18432b475148ba5e66f52 SHA-1: 63cc17af2c74e4c4dd1da02f4f1c4ff5bae36f0b SHA-256: 90140dd9c7294af651eefd13cdbc60a6ba9b828a8309e94bce85a43009c5472b
138 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1203 Exploitation for Client Execution T1059.001 PowerShell

The PDF sample contains an embedded script payload and triggers the CVE-2010-0188 exploit for Adobe Reader. This indicates the file is designed to achieve arbitrary code execution. The embedded URL is likely part of the exploit chain or a command and control channel. The ML classifier strongly supports a malicious verdict.

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 59654 bytes
SHA-256: c9e113709152b751b61c2cb11a9f596c91e99a0a29bb20105890f23b3f74dc09
embedded_file_obj0044.bin pdf-embedded-file PDF EmbeddedFile object 44 at offset 0x1FED 144 bytes
SHA-256: 3dd68f00f4fcb366a2a3a17c65cb2626eeddf5ea5713302d374310561d810169
embedded_file_obj0045.bin pdf-embedded-file PDF EmbeddedFile object 45 at offset 0x209A 77 bytes
SHA-256: 10c03f88a5f0a0833dc5b2c8ac295b3a3c6f65e23889eb8cc1dc6fe29bf7f275