Emotet — Office (OLE) / .XLSX malware analysis

Static analysis result for SHA-256 c697061db058e581…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLSX

94.8 KB Created: 2006-09-15 19:15:53 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel
MD5: 388a0611ed3b78843c822beece3c4554 SHA-1: a3492f38d4591b25e5e0794e3e52bed21efdadd5 SHA-256: c697061db058e58182f6929c1d5ef718da2e2e05b4e06d4518218efc8c7888fd
450 Risk Score

Malware Insights

Emotet · confidence 95%

MITRE ATT&CK
T1566.002 Spearphishing Attachment T1059.005 Visual Basic T1218.011 Signed Binary Proxy Execution: Rundll32 T1059.003 Windows Command Shell T1105 Ingress Tool Transfer

The file is an Excel spreadsheet containing VBA macros, including an Auto_Open macro, which is a common delivery mechanism for Emotet. The document body presents a fake invoice lure to encourage users to enable macros. The VBA code utilizes GetObject and CreateObject to launch Win32_Process, and references mshta.exe to execute a URL, indicating it downloads and executes a second-stage payload. The ClamAV detection name 'Xls.Downloader.Emotet-a5251d3d2d6d3722-9951020-0' further supports the Emotet family attribution.

Heuristics 12

  • LOLBin reference in VBA critical OLE_VBA_LOLBIN
    LOLBin reference in VBA
  • VBA WMI Win32_Process launcher critical OLE_VBA_WMI_PROCESS_CREATE
    VBA macro builds or references a WMI moniker for Win32_Process and invokes .Create to start a command. This is a high-confidence macro execution chain that often hides the WMI class name through string concatenation or helper functions.
  • ClamAV: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-a5251d3d2d6d3722-9951020-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-a5251d3d2d6d3722-9951020-0
  • Reference to mshta.exe high SC_STR_MSHTA
    Reference to mshta.exe
  • Auto_Open macro high OLE_VBA_AUTO
    Auto_Open macro
  • GetObject call high OLE_VBA_GETOBJ
    GetObject 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.
  • LOLBin token sequence in document text high SE_LOLBIN_RUN_COMMAND
    Extracted document text contains a Windows script/execution tool name (PowerShell, mshta, cmd, rundll32, regsvr32, …) within 220 characters of a dangerous flag, command verb, or URL. This is a visible 'run this' instruction in HTML/PDF/RTF lure bodies, or — in macro-laden Office files — the macro's own string-pool entries appearing adjacent in extracted text.
  • 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
  • Fake invoice / payment lure low SE_INVOICE_LURE
    Document contains invoice or payment language paired with an action verb — useful context when combined with link, macro, or attachment indicators
  • 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://91.240.118.172/hh/hh.html

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
macros.bas
557c882097214c255743895cb0e70759651b1dffef6be5737b5fd93877dbbf47		 vba-macro oletools.olevba.extract_macros (decoded VBA source) 10171 bytes
Detection
ClamAV: No threats found
Obfuscation or payload: likely
Carved artifact contains 1 shell/COM execution token(s). Carved macro source contains an auto-exec entry point and execution/download terms.

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