Malicious PDF — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 9d4a82cdf2c84626…

MALICIOUS

PDF

90.0 KB
MD5: 3178775acba70bd6c8d9ccf1c5c6b553 SHA-1: c5411cf8287e8283349ef12210c824a4407b5e8a SHA-256: 9d4a82cdf2c84626e7b0ea3aa7e1bb40b0ed87c64e7ac3e8e01fdff6579ffde3
248 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1204.002 Malicious File: User Execution T1059.001 Command and Scripting Interpreter: PowerShell

The sample is a PDF file that utilizes XFA (XML Forms Architecture) and contains a heap spray exploit targeting CVE-2010-0188. This exploit is designed to execute arbitrary code when the PDF is opened in a vulnerable version of Adobe Reader. The embedded script within the XFA form is responsible for triggering this exploit, likely leading to the download and execution of a secondary payload.

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.
  • XFA form contains executable script high CVE related PDF_XFA_SCRIPT
    PDF embeds an XFA form whose dataset contains a <script> or <xfa:script> block — XFA scripting has been the exploit primitive for several Adobe Reader RCEs (CVE-2010-0188 family, CVE-2018-4901, and others). Plain XFA without scripts is far less risky.
  • XFA JavaScript heap-spray exploit code critical PDF_XFA_HEAP_SPRAY
    PDF contains XFA script content with heap-spray or shellcode-like JavaScript markers such as large encoded word sequences, util.pack, large arrays, or spray variable names. This is a weaponised Adobe Reader exploit pattern, not a normal interactive form.
  • ClamAV: Pdf.Exploit.Agent-6136306-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Pdf.Exploit.Agent-6136306-0
  • Embedded script payload in PDF stream medium 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.
  • XFA form low PDF_XFA
    PDF uses XML Forms Architecture — can contain script logic
  • 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://ns.adobe.com/xdp/
    • http://www.xfa.org/schema/xfa-template/2.5/
    • http://www.xfa.org/schema/xfa-data/1.0/

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
embedded_pdf_script_0000023c.bin
e6a18c3c3ec7d8bcfb24b3c0d2f222a7df7acb412a5d525cffd5131511546ce4
pdf-embedded-script PDF raw stream script payload at offset 0x23C 91488 bytes