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

Static analysis result for SHA-256 e4e32d49dbad5eb4…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLSX

2.24 MB
MD5: 32f7fe408c255a42d27acf98b425c1e2 SHA-1: 0b765d750f7a562590ff6b1adac6fa53c6e8ba23 SHA-256: e4e32d49dbad5eb4dbd2ceeb2c3de55bf272274712202e6b4e564cde55ab1cdb
180 Risk Score

Malware Insights

MITRE ATT&CK
T1204 Malicious Link T1566.001 Spearphishing Attachment

The sample is an encrypted Office document that contains an embedded Equation Editor OLE object. Heuristics indicate that this object is anomalous and likely carries a payload, exploiting CVE-2018-0798. The default password encryption further suggests malicious intent. The primary attack vector is likely a spearphishing attachment leading to exploitation of the Equation Editor vulnerability for initial execution.

Heuristics 5

  • Equation Editor OLE object high CVE related OLE_EQUATION_EDITOR
    Default-encrypted OOXML embedded OLE object xl/embeddings/oleObject1.bin contains the Equation Editor CLSID, the legacy component exploited by CVE-2017-11882, CVE-2018-0802, and CVE-2018-0798.
  • CVE-2018-0798 — anomalous Equation Editor native stream high CVE likely CVE_2018_0798_EQUATION_NATIVE_ANOMALY
    Default-encrypted OOXML contains embedded Equation Editor data with anomalous native stream bytes consistent with a CVE-2018-0798-style exploit. This is treated as likely CVE evidence because the Equation object is malformed and payload-like.
  • Default-encrypted OOXML exploit carrier layout high OOXML_ENCRYPTED_EXPLOIT_CARRIER_SHAPE
    Default-password encrypted OOXML package contains embedded OLE object parts and additional activation/decoy parts. This layout is common in malicious Excel exploit delivery and requires inspecting the decrypted package.
  • Equation Editor object carries payload-like Ole10Native stream high OLE_EQUATION_OLE10NATIVE_PAYLOAD_ANOMALY
    Default-encrypted OOXML embedded OLE object declares the Equation Editor CLSID but stores a large high-entropy Ole10Native stream with malformed package sizing. This is exploit-shaped Equation/OLE payload evidence.
  • Office OOXML encrypted with default VelvetSweatshop password medium OFFICE_DEFAULT_PASSWORD_ENCRYPTED_OOXML
    OLE EncryptedPackage decrypts with Excel's built-in VelvetSweatshop password. Office opens this transparently, and malware uses it to hide OOXML exploit parts from scanners that only inspect the outer OLE container.

Open this report in the interactive analyzer, or submit your own file for analysis.