Malicious Office (OLE) — malware analysis report

Static analysis result for SHA-256 ddb7fdc767804d89…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE)

250.5 KB Created: 2020-08-04 07:29:21 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel First seen: 2020-09-07
MD5: 1b4c1358ba459fca836502adcbc23bd9 SHA-1: 4c6636212c228a2dd011c847247178e4f04e0415 SHA-256: ddb7fdc767804d890d0eba40fb74b7c1c1e6e152e3214b209a2368e403d3a0eb
180 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1566.001 Spearphishing Attachment T1059.005 Visual Basic T1203 Exploitation for Client Execution

The sample is an Excel 4.0 macro-enabled document containing an Auto_Open macro. The document body displays a common social engineering lure to trick users into enabling macros. The presence of the Auto_Open macro and the use of dangerous formula APIs like RUN indicate an attempt to execute arbitrary code, likely to download and run a second-stage payload.

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.
  • XLM Auto_Open with dangerous formula APIs critical OLE_XLM_DANGEROUS_FN
    Excel 4.0 macro sheet contains an Auto_Open / Auto_Close entry and dangerous XLM formula APIs that can invoke programs, write files, or transfer control without VBA.
  • XLM Auto_Open environment-evasion HALT gate high OLE_XLM_ENVIRONMENT_EVASION_HALT
    Excel 4.0 macro sheet auto-executes multiple GET.WORKSPACE / GET.WINDOW environment checks and halts execution when the host does not match the expected user environment. This is a common sandbox-evasion pattern in XLM malware and is stronger than a bare XLM macro-sheet indicator.
  • 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.

Extracted artifacts 1

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
xlm_macros.txt xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 267135 bytes
SHA-256: c1f50f4bac0ef06f41ec81f8e919ffb4a5c8d3c580a040105208b2724f8d99af
Preview script
First 1,000 lines of the extracted script
' 0085     14 BOUNDSHEET : Sheet Information - worksheet or dialog sheet, visible -  Sheet
' 0085     13 BOUNDSHEET : Sheet Information - Excel 4.0 macro sheet, visible -  nuHO
' 0018     22 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - aNhddoq len=0 
' 0018     23 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - built-in-name 1 Auto_Open hidden len=7 ptgNameX  NAMEIDX 11 
' 0018     21 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - cDhYNe len=0 
' 0018     21 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - CoIGtX len=0 
' 0018     20 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - CWpmQ len=0 
' 0018     24 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - etTMHuKwc len=0 
' 0018     26 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - eWwqEcoXgSY len=0 
' 0018     24 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - IHuONibBL len=0 
' 0018     24 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - IlbhLohHY len=0 
' 0018     22 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - jpccuDS len=0 
' 0018     27 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant -       hidden len=7 ptgRef3d  Sheet!ER7610 
' 0018     24 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - lAPzetzZQ len=0 
' 0018     20 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - pSiwU len=0 
' 0018     21 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - QMnSlV len=0 
' 0018     24 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - QZqRRyFpc len=0 
' 0018     26 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - tiaVWHvCWGf len=0 
' 0018     27 LABEL : Cell Value, String Constant - xKYiGcOKbgWs len=0 
' 002a      2 PRINTHEADERS : Print Row/Column Labels
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Cell Value, String Constant/ SST
' 00fd     10 LABELSST : Ce
... (truncated)