Malicious RTF / .DOC — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 b212e2eadd1f3f82…

MALICIOUS

RTF / .DOC

15.4 KB First seen: 2022-10-05
MD5: a35348c71a89292d9ce52db8cb8bdbde SHA-1: fc9bd9b3cf1cbb5801ffb5a8b50c8873fe04dc0b SHA-256: b212e2eadd1f3f82221785838169d2500d4a782786e50f0e4c14a42ec5a12900
220 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1566.001 Spearphishing Attachment T1204.002 Malicious File T1059.005 Visual Basic

The RTF document contains a malicious OLE object specifically targeting the Equation Editor vulnerability (CVE-2017-11882). The presence of `RTF_EQUATION_EDITOR` and `CVE_2017_11882_ACTIVATION_RELATED` heuristics strongly indicates exploitation of this known vulnerability. The `SE_ENABLE_LURE` heuristic suggests the document prompts the user to enable content, a common social engineering tactic for macro-based malware delivery. The decoded OLE object's ProgID `eQUaTiOn.3` is included as an IOC.

Heuristics 6

  • 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.
  • 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.
  • Automatically linked OLE object high RTF_OBJAUTLINK
    RTF contains \objautlink — an automatically linked OLE object surface that can be updated or activated when Word opens the document.
  • \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_off000014f0.bin
e26aa3a379de16d00cfb0f6ee15aa688e6e0721e5f0ae379effb92d1705ac481		 rtf-objdata-decoded RTF \objdata at offset 0x14F0 1577 bytes

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