Malicious RTF / .DOC — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 a3e1420a5070b68c…

MALICIOUS

RTF / .DOC

41.4 KB First seen: 2023-02-02
MD5: 98975865c4d492a761aba67b63fc5cd6 SHA-1: 773a5957c8a34d9cdac358289e3db29024fc633b SHA-256: a3e1420a5070b68c12e43769dfd8cdec7ddfba0061487d66c36506382f1192e7
140 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1204 User Execution: Malicious Link T1059.005 PowerShell

The sample is an RTF document that contains embedded OLE object data and specifically targets the Equation Editor vulnerability. The 'SE_ENABLE_LURE' heuristic indicates that the document prompts the user to enable editing, a common tactic to bypass security measures. The presence of `RTF_EQUATION_EDITOR` and `RTF_OBJUPDATE` strongly suggests an attempt to exploit a known vulnerability, likely leading to the download and execution of a secondary payload.

Heuristics 4

  • 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.
  • \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 1 \objdata section(s) — embedded OLE objects
  • Macro/content-enable lure medium SE_ENABLE_LURE
    Document instructs the user to enable macros or editing — a common technique used by malware droppers to bypass Office macro security settings

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
objdata_00_off00005613.bin
585a9ea5aeacde0161b256b158c6bd73c5d20f14c3380aaf94c4093841c84763
rtf-objdata-decoded RTF \objdata at offset 0x5613 1927 bytes