Emotet — Office (OLE) / .XLS malware analysis

Static analysis result for SHA-256 e598b9700e13f2cb…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLS

73.5 KB Created: 2015-06-05 18:19:34 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel First seen: 2022-05-18
MD5: acd3d4e8f63f52eaf57467a76ca2389d SHA-1: 4a42b5e7e7fd43ddefc856f45bb95d97656ddca6 SHA-256: e598b9700e13f2cb1c30c6d9230152ed5716a6d6e25db702576fefeb6638005e
200 Risk Score

Malware Insights

Emotet · confidence 95%

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

The file contains Excel 4.0 macros, specifically an Auto_Open macro, which is a known technique for executing malicious code. The macros are designed to download and execute a second-stage payload from a list of hardcoded URLs. ClamAV also identified the file as 'Xls.Downloader.Emotet-ea85857e7e81817a-9950241-0', strongly suggesting the Emotet family.

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.
  • ClamAV: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-ea85857e7e81817a-9950241-0 critical CLAMAV_DETECTION
    ClamAV detected this file as malware: Xls.Downloader.Emotet-ea85857e7e81817a-9950241-0
  • 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
cde40ac8101f526fd4a9300ec8b1668ace4e30df6493fc373c611b3342d60d83		 xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 7173 bytes

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