I had a bit of a problem trying to analyse this malware today. The word doc looks pretty average at first glance, but trying to run it in Anyrun on a W7 32 or 64 bit version of windows. gave me VBA errors. It also wouldn’t run on 64 bit versions of W8.1 or W10, giving the same VBA errors I then tried to upload to IRIS-H analysis where it crashed. It wouldn’t even upload to Hybrid analysis using either 32 bit W7 or 64 bit. I think Anyrun uses Office 2010 on W7 and Office 2013 on W8.1. I am not sure what VBA code works on Office 2016 or higher but won’t on older versions or only works on 32 bit versions on O16 or O19.
After a bit of trial and error & seeing references to office 16 in the code, I tried a 32 bit bit version of W10 using Office 2019 on Anyrun and that ran the macro successfully, downloaded the payload but crashed partway through on running the payload.
I then ran the payload on a 64 bit W7 on Anyrun where it was fully revealed to be AveMaria stealer / RAT in all its glory
Opticsense New Order.doc Current Virus total detections: Anyrun W10 32 bit |W7 32 | W7 64 | W10 64 | W8.1 64 |
This malware doc downloaded from http://87.236.212.241/fixx/Black.exe virusTotal URL | File | Anyrun W7 64 |
I don’t know why the vba macro in the doc won’t seem to run on a 64 bit version of windows
Update: I am informed this uses the VBA stomping (https://medium.com/walmartlabs/vba-stomping-advanced-maldoc-techniques-612c484ab278) technique to hide the VBA source code & only use the compiled P-code. This has the effect of effectively preventing most antiviruses from detecting malicious code in the file, where they normally only scan the VBA source code, not compiled code. However it does conversely vastly reduce the number of potential victims because “A VBA stomped maldoc can only be executed using the same VBA version used to create the document”
Apparently it did upload to Hybrid analysis (https://www.hybrid-analysis.com/sample/385966f3d6be7b234a790e2dfa2573f1ab1bc72e78bce73bb479a11a54784c73). It just continually displayed the upload in progress message for me
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The email looks like:
From: [email protected]
Date: Mon 22/04/2021 10:15
Subject: Re:Opticsense New Order
Attachment: Opticsense New Order.doc
Body Content:
Hello customer,
Good morning, Sorry for the late reply, We have received your quotation early and we find it a pleasure to place our new order in a reply to your quotation.
So attached is your new purchase order for your reference.
Note: 1. Treat your purchase order with high priority regarding Optic Sense UAE
- Keep your email secure for smooth transaction between your company and OPTICSENSE UAE
Thanks with best regards,
time,
Procurement Section
Visual Sense
Address: First Floor, Best Bhafan,
Best Marg Kolaba, Mumbai – 400 001
the phone. Number: + 91-22-22856262 (operator)
Fax: 022-22851244
E-mail: [email protected], [email protected]
URL: https://www.opticsenseuae.com.com
All the alleged senders, companies, names of employees, phone numbers, amounts, reference numbers etc. mentioned in the emails are all innocent and are just picked at random. Some of these companies will exist and some won’t. Don’t try to respond by phone or email, all you will do is end up with an innocent person or company who have had their details spoofed and picked at random from a long list that the bad guys have previously found . The bad guys choose companies, Government departments and other organisations with subjects that are designed to entice you or alarm you into blindly opening the attachment or clicking the link in the email to see what is happening.
This email attachment contains what appears to be a genuine word doc or Excel XLS spreadsheet with either a macro script or an embedded OLE object that when run will infect you.
Modern versions of Microsoft office, that is Office 2010, 2013, 2016 and Office 365 should be automatically set to higher security to protect you.
By default protected view (https://support.office.com/en-gb/article/What-is-Protected-View-d6f09ac7-e6b9-4495-8e43-2bbcdbcb6653) is enabled and macros are disabled, UNLESS you or your company have enabled them. If protected view (https://support.office.com/en-gb/article/What-is-Protected-View-d6f09ac7-e6b9-4495-8e43-2bbcdbcb6653) mode is turned off and macros are enabled then opening this malicious word document will infect you, and simply previewing it in windows explorer or your email client might well be enough to infect you. Definitely DO NOT follow the advice they give to enable macros or enable editing to see the content.
Most of these malicious word documents either appear to be totally blank or look something like these images when opened in protected view (https://support.office.com/en-gb/article/What-is-Protected-View-d6f09ac7-e6b9-4495-8e43-2bbcdbcb6653) mode, which should be the default in Office 2010, 2013, 2016 and 365. Some versions pretend to have a digital RSA key and say you need to enable editing and Macros to see the content. Do NOT enable Macros or editing under any circumstances.
What Can Be Infected By This
At this time, these malicious macros only infect windows computers. They do not affect a Mac, IPhone, IPad, Blackberry, Windows phone or Android phone.
The malicious word or excel file can open on any device with an office program installed, and potentially the macro will run on Windows or Mac or any other device with Microsoft Office installed. BUT the downloaded malware that the macro tries to download is windows specific, so will not harm, install or infect any other computer except a windows computer. You will not be infected if you do not have macros enabled in Excel or Word. These Macros do not run in “Office Online” (https://products.office.com/en-gb/office-online/documents-spreadsheets-presentations-office-online) Open Office, Libre Office, Word Perfect or any other office program that can read Word or Excel files.
Please read our How to protect yourselves page for simple, sensible advice on how to avoid being infected by this sort of socially engineered malware. Also please read our post about word macro malware and how to avoid being infected by them
Be very careful with email attachments. All of these emails use Social engineering (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_engineering_(security)) tricks to persuade you to open the attachments that come with the email. It might be a simple message saying “look at this picture of me I took last night” that appears to come from a friend. It might be a scare ware message that will make you open the attachment to see what you are accused of doing. Frequently it is more targeted at somebody ( small companies etc.) who regularly receive PDF attachments or Word .doc attachments or any other common file that you use every day, for example an invoice addressed to [email protected].
The basic rule is NEVER open any attachment to an email, unless you are expecting it. Now that is very easy to say but quite hard to put into practice, because we all get emails with files attached to them. Our friends and family love to send us pictures of them doing silly things, or even cute pictures of the children or pets. Many of us routinely get Word, Excel or PowerPoint attachments in the course of work or from companies that we already have a relationship with.
Never just blindly click on the file in your email program. Always save the file to your downloads folder, so you can check it first. A lot of malicious files that are attached to emails will have a faked extension. That is the 3 letters at the end of the file name.
Unfortunately windows by default hides the file extensions so you need to Set your folder options to “show known file types. Then when you unzip the zip file that is supposed to contain the pictures of “Sally’s dog catching a ball”, an invoice or receipt from some company for a product or service or receive a Word doc or Excel file report that work has supposedly sent you to finish working on at the weekend, you can easily see if it is a picture or document & not a malicious program. If you see JS or .EXE or .COM or .PIF or .SCR or .HTA .vbs, .wsf , .jse .jar at the end of the file name DO NOT click on it or try to open it, it will infect you.
With these malformed infected word, excel and other office documents that normally contain a vba macro virus, the vital thing is do not open any office document direct from your email client or the web. Always save the document to a safe location on your computer, normally your downloads folder or your documents folder and scan it with your antivirus. Many Antiviruses do not natively detect vba macro-viruses in real time protection and you need to enable document or office protection in the settings. Do not rely on your Anti-Virus to immediately detect the malware or malicious content. DO NOT enable editing mode or enable macros
All modern versions of word and other office programs, that is 2010, 2013, 2016 and 365, should open all Microsoft office documents that is word docs, excel files and PowerPoint etc that are downloaded from the web or received in an email automatically in “protected view” (https://support.office.com/en-gb/article/What-is-Protected-View-d6f09ac7-e6b9-4495-8e43-2bbcdbcb6653) that stops any embedded malware or macros from being displayed and running.
Make sure protected view is set in all office programs to protect you and your company from these sorts of attacks and do not over ride it to edit the document until you are 100% sure that it is a safe document. If the protected mode bar appears when opening the document DO NOT enable editing mode or enable macros the document will look blank or have a warning message, but will be safe.
Be aware that there are a lot of dodgy word docs spreading that WILL infect you with no action from you if you are still using an out dated or vulnerable version of word. This is a good reason to update your office programs to a recent version and stop using office 2003 and 2007.
Many of us have continued to use older versions of word and other office programs, because they are convenient, have the functions and settings we are used to and have never seen a need to update to the latest super-duper version. The risks in using older version are now seriously starting to outweigh the convenience, benefits and cost of keeping an old version going.
I strongly urge you to update your office software to the latest version and stop putting yourself at risk, using old out of date software.
IOC:
Main object- “Opticsense New Order.doc”
sha256 385966f3d6be7b234a790e2dfa2573f1ab1bc72e78bce73bb479a11a54784c73
sha1 4d6ac6c867d22d5e54499606b9705ff126a587e7
md5 56ff38d5a61f29004c1ee68ffd4f29d1
Dropped executable file
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Temp\wnhw.exe 1e95b6a94962671b5ed67849a5beb888a72cf125a8cca56ab6f9f7dd8f96a6cf
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\INetCache\IE\B713ULK5\upnp[1].exe 0244cbf1fbf8809c335b9bbd8142c72e3bbb36881e0aacfba6000e0aaa048ba9
sha256 C:\Program Files\Microsoft DN1\sqlmap.dll 861ad4bbf682b35affda23fab92c8db945f3fa34f78177843c87802d1fd02020
Connections
ip 65.55.163.91
ip 87.236.212.241
ip 52.114.6.46
ip 216.170.123.196
ip 5.206.225.104
ip 173.223.11.175
HTTP/HTTPS requests
url http://87.236.212.241/fixx/Black.exe
url http://5.206.225.104/dll/upnp.exe
Main object- “Black.exe”
sha256 1e95b6a94962671b5ed67849a5beb888a72cf125a8cca56ab6f9f7dd8f96a6cf
sha1 d7c2c278f42a4e0d4cbccf77de6adb24a9ec3827
md5 f5026299891e9351167633f655c9a682
Dropped executable file
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Temp\dismcore.dll fc0c90044b94b080f307c16494369a0796ac1d4e74e7912ba79c15cca241801c
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\D2U1WPAC\upnp[1].exe 0244cbf1fbf8809c335b9bbd8142c72e3bbb36881e0aacfba6000e0aaa048ba9
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\BDW1XBVN\softokn3[1].dll bb3ff746471116c6ad0339fa0522aa2a44a787e33a29c7b27649a054ecd4d00f
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\D2U1WPAC\msvcp140[1].dll 334e69ac9367f708ce601a6f490ff227d6c20636da5222f148b25831d22e13d4
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\K78MRVB5\mozglue[1].dll fb419a60305f17359e2ac0510233ee80e845885eee60607715c67dd88e501ef0
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\HQYU0XHJ\vcruntime140[1].dll c40bb03199a2054dabfc7a8e01d6098e91de7193619effbd0f142a7bf031c14d
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\BDW1XBVN\freebl3[1].dll 2b00fc4f541ac10c94e3556ff28e30a801811c36422546a546a445aca3f410f7
sha256 C:\Users\admin\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Temporary Internet Files\Content.IE5\D2U1WPAC\nss3[1].dll 78758bf7f3b3b5e3477e38354acd32d787bc1286c8bd9b873471b9c195e638db
Connections
ip 216.170.123.196
ip 5.206.225.104
HTTP/HTTPS requests
url http://5.206.225.104/dll/softokn3.dll
url http://5.206.225.104/dll/upnp.exe
url http://5.206.225.104/dll/msvcp140.dll
url http://5.206.225.104/dll/vcruntime140.dll
url http://5.206.225.104/dll/mozglue.dll
url http://5.206.225.104/dll/freebl3.dll
url http://5.206.225.104/dll/nss3.dll