Malicious Office (OLE) / .XLS — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 d59e2f51017cbdba…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLS

104.0 KB Created: 2006-09-16 00:00:00 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel
MD5: 58ad025a1b774784958e9759167eacef SHA-1: eb32d61b321d96dad430a229e10cf8e29b39fa8f SHA-256: d59e2f51017cbdba301b87bf66bcda4b2db53e98acd39e25744b9afa4649c117
120 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1059.005 Visual Basic for Applications T1204.002 Malicious File

The sample is an Excel 4.0 (XLM) macro-enabled spreadsheet that uses an Auto_Open macro. It presents a lure to the user, impersonating DocuSign to encourage macro execution. The extracted URLs and the presence of `rundll32` with `DllRegisterServer` suggest the macro is intended to download and execute a second-stage payload. The macro script itself is truncated, preventing a full analysis of its behavior.

Heuristics 4

  • Excel 4.0 Auto_Open defined name critical OLE_XLM_AUTOOPEN_DEFINEDNAME
    oletools recovered an Auto_Open / Auto_Close entry from an Excel 4.0 macro sheet. The raw BIFF name can be tokenized or partially opaque to byte-string checks, but the recovered macro listing confirms the workbook has an XLM auto-execution entry.
  • Excel 4.0 (XLM) macro sheet present medium OLE_XLM_AUTOOPEN
    Workbook contains an Excel 4.0 macro sheet sub-stream — XLM is rarely seen in modern legitimate workbooks and was a major Office malware vector during 2020-2022.
  • 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
  • Document signing service impersonation lure medium SE_DOCUSIGN_LURE
    Document impersonates DocuSign, Adobe Sign, or a similar signing service in a signing-request context

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
xlm_macros.txt
f6f94d67da6884829caad9c6254d35920c4ca40818ef183c6a43675671038d32
xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 3048 bytes