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

Static analysis result for SHA-256 f3ace912238e2d76…

MALICIOUS

Office (OLE) / .XLSX

1.10 MB Created: 2006-09-16 00:00:00 Authoring application: Microsoft Excel
MD5: c94fec556c1df797389704a5e7457798 SHA-1: 5f388515580968fd6b524c9e33861953e0363675 SHA-256: f3ace912238e2d767debf5e1a1f331f7873e306300af076ef7bd84f9db21f01a
150 Risk Score

Malware Insights

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

The sample leverages the CVE-2017-0199 vulnerability via an OLE2Link object to fetch a remote payload from the URL 'https://ljg.cl/IxJ4?&attenuation=ethereal&chess=flipped-out&cold=ahead&elongation=absorbing&breakpoint'. The embedded PDF, while containing only images, is also flagged as suspicious. The overall document structure and heuristic firings strongly indicate an advance-fee scam lure, aiming to trick the user into opening the malicious file and triggering the exploit.

Heuristics 5

  • OLE2Link / URL Moniker → remote loader — CVE-2017-0199 critical CVE likely CVE_2017_0199
    Document contains an embedded OLE link object whose URL Moniker points to a remote URL. When the host file is opened, Office follows the link, downloads the URL, and processes the response based on its Content-Type (HTA -> mshta.exe, RTF → Word, etc.) — the documented CVE-2017-0199 primitive. The URL extension is not a reliable filter; servers can return different payloads to Office's user agent.
  • Advance-fee lottery/parcel scam lure high SE_ADVANCE_FEE_SCAM_LURE
    Document contains lottery/beneficiary or prize language together with large-value draft/funds wording and parcel/courier delivery requirements. This is a classic advance-fee fraud document shape.
  • Secondary embedded PDF body has suspicious static findings high POLYGLOT_CHILD_PDF_STATIC_TRIAGE
    A valid PDF body was found at a nonzero offset inside another container and its carved contents matched PDF exploit or lure heuristics. This catches polyglots where the top-level magic routes to ZIP/OLE while a PDF reader or downstream parser opens the hidden PDF payload.
  • VBA project contains no executable statements low OLE_VBA_MACROS
    Document contains a VBA project, but extracted modules only contain attributes/options/comments and no executable statements.
  • PDF paints image(s) but contains no text operators info PDF_IMAGE_ONLY_LURE
    PDF has 1 image XObject(s) and the content stream contains no text-emitting operators (BT/ET, Tj, TJ, ', ") in either raw bytes or decompressed streams — this is the screenshot-as-PDF pattern used to bypass text-based scanners and to deliver instructions purely through rendered pixels. It is informational unless paired with invisible links or risky URI context.

Extracted artifacts 2

Files carved from inside the sample during analysis.

FilenameKindSourceSize
macros.bas
7f506327609c082af1cd37dde23bc2c71a000f7d1ef530b6abb66775040a7673		 vba-macro oletools.olevba.extract_macros (decoded VBA source) 1206 bytes
polyglot_child_pdf_off0005e000.pdf
e6bc94b2ace9af64482a26b782bfe684810c9c6fd3f162dce0c132f8e86e31dc		 polyglot-child-pdf Secondary PDF body inside ole container at offset 0x5E000 773120 bytes

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