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

Static analysis result for SHA-256 e618b608828a21e8…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLSX

143.5 KB Created: 2006-09-16 00:00:00 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel First seen: 2022-05-31
MD5: 091ead19f5f4ef7aa8e9dc0506eb1059 SHA-1: 779a501d26d4e569176e1d82bb85c2935b8473d3 SHA-256: e618b608828a21e84a24d612dee644621901e6d14e38504d5addd22a5d1a873a
120 Risk Score

Malware Insights

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

The sample contains Excel 4.0 macros, specifically an Auto_Open macro, designed to execute when the document is opened. It also contains a lure to enable macros, impersonating DocuSign to encourage user interaction. The macros likely download a second-stage payload from one of the provided URLs. The presence of an Auto_Open macro and the DocuSign lure strongly indicate a malicious intent to deliver further malware.

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
c06303a4d2d9f3242c9a0e11a903b4059f80ff43a79c026b8de7cea5292556c9
xlm-macro oletools.olevba.extract_all_macros (XLM macro listing) 2730 bytes