Malicious RTF — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 9465f176081de01a…

MALICIOUS

RTF

2.61 MB First seen: 2022-05-31
MD5: be5a29b21eb26844190eabf4c318b1d4 SHA-1: ce8ef721d6bed9d967e3d57fe570bb06bc24d5db SHA-256: 9465f176081de01a27faaa60812dc72012afa3102722dd25ed4f244ba2bd407c
340 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1204.002 Malicious File T1566.001 Spearphishing Attachment T1204 User Execution

The RTF file contains embedded OLE objects and specifically triggers the CVE-2017-11882 vulnerability through the Equation Editor. This indicates the file is designed to exploit this known vulnerability to execute arbitrary code. The ClamAV detection name 'Rtf.Dropper.Agent-9965975-1' further suggests its role as a dropper for malicious payloads. The embedded hex data contains a PE header, confirming the presence of an executable payload.

Heuristics 8

  • Equation Editor activation — CVE-2017-11882 related high CVE related CVE_2017_11882_ACTIVATION_RELATED
    RTF decodes to an Equation.3 ProgID and requests OLE activation with \objemb plus \objupdate. This reaches the legacy Equation Editor attack surface used by CVE-2017-11882/CVE-2018-0802 documents, but the malformed MTEF/native payload needed for stronger attribution was not recovered.
  • Composite Moniker in RTF OLE object high CVE related RTF_COMPOSITE_MONIKER_RELATED
    RTF contains Composite Moniker CLSID in OLE object context, but no nearby scriptlet/SCT payload was confirmed. Treat as related moniker attack-surface evidence rather than proof of CVE-2017-8570 exploitation.
  • Split hex Equation Editor ProgID + OLE object critical RTF_EQUATION_EDITOR
    RTF embeds the Equation.3 ProgID as hex bytes near OLE object activation and splits the byte stream with whitespace or an ignorable RTF group. This is an Equation Editor OLE activation surface commonly used by CVE-2017-11882 / CVE-2018-0802 exploit documents.
  • PE header (with DOS stub) in hex data critical RTF_MZ_HEX
    Hex-encoded PE (MZ + DOS stub) found inside RTF — likely an embedded executable payload
  • ClamAV: Rtf.Dropper.Agent-9965975-1 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Rtf.Dropper.Agent-9965975-1
  • \objupdate forces OLE activation high RTF_OBJUPDATE
    RTF contains \objupdate — forces automatic OLE object instantiation when the document is opened, bypassing user interaction. Almost exclusively seen in Equation Editor exploit documents.
  • OLE object data medium RTF_OBJDATA
    RTF contains 2 \objdata section(s) — embedded OLE objects
  • Embedded OLE object medium RTF_OBJEMB
    RTF contains \objemb — embedded OLE object

Extracted artifacts 2

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
objdata_00_off00001291.bin
7dbd99011f245e69eba888b188ee9806ee8c1bd5a996c5dd400f4f26dd5844a0		 rtf-objdata-decoded RTF \objdata at offset 0x1291 369451 bytes
objdata_01_off000c123c.bin
c15a908dd43ec603b552f3652117fbcce46d419a9a10490458118a5a4409d1b8		 rtf-objdata-decoded RTF \objdata at offset 0xC123C 462749 bytes

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