Is prod.keys safe?
No engines detected a threat, and the widely circulated INI file produced no offensive behavior or adverse host-reputation findings during the completed sandbox run.
All 75 antivirus engines reported no detection, including 17 tier-1 engines. The file has circulated broadly for nearly two years, while one completed sandbox run found no offensive techniques, malicious verdict, dropped payload, or adverse reputation for its sole contacted domain.
039895c6e93a0c6208…334a6fa252c112Recommended next actions
Before opening
Open it only when its sender or download source is one you independently trust.
If you already opened it
Keep normal device protection enabled and stop if the file behaves unexpectedly.
Intelligence
The saved assessment, checked against the scan evidence and recorded coverage.
The reasoning behind this verdict
This section explains the evidence supporting the verdict and keeps conflicting or missing signals visible.
All 75 antivirus engines reported no detection, including 17 tier-1 engines. The file has circulated broadly for nearly two years, while one completed sandbox run found no offensive techniques, malicious verdict, dropped payload, or adverse reputation for its sole contacted domain.
The scan produced no malicious or suspicious detections among 75 engines, and all 17 tier-1 participants were silent. The file is an established INI-format item submitted 2,856 times by 2,420 sources over 712 days, which strongly reduces concern about an undiscovered active threat. One completed sandbox run recorded no offensive techniques and no malicious sandbox assessment. Its four MITRE entries reflect ambient system and file-opening activity rather than malware-exclusive behavior. The host check covered the only observed domain and found no malicious or suspicious reputation entry. Contaminated sandbox text was ignored, while the independent engine, prevalence, and runtime evidence remained consistently benign.
What We Detected
None of 75 antivirus engines flagged the file, including 17 tier-1 engines. This INI-format file has been submitted 2,856 times by 2,420 sources over 712 days, providing substantial history without an associated threat family.
Threat Behavior
One completed sandbox run recorded no offensive techniques and no malicious sandbox assessment. The observed activity involved ordinary file-opening and Windows Explorer operations. The only contacted domain was fully covered by the host-reputation check and had no malicious or suspicious entry; no dropped payload hashes were recorded.
What To Do Now
No remediation is indicated by the available evidence. Because files with a .keys extension may contain licenses, credentials, or other secrets, handle its contents according to their sensitivity and keep endpoint protection enabled.
Where this verdict could be wrong2 caveats
- adversarialInputFlags.sandboxTextInjectionSuspected=true indicates contaminated sandbox text; that text was ignored and did not influence the assessment.
- externalIntel.availability shows YARAify and MalwareBazaar were skipped, so those intelligence sources provided no additional coverage.
These are the assessment's weak points. If you believe one applies to your file, report the verdict and we'll re-review it.
- 0/75 engines reported a malicious or suspicious result.
- 17/17 tier-1 engines that reported found no detection.
- 2,420 unique sources submitted the hash 2,856 times over 712 days.
- behaviour.offensiveCount=0 and behaviour.hasMaliciousSandboxVerdict=false.
- contactedHosts inspected the sole observed domain and returned 0 malicious and 0 suspicious hosts.
- externalIntel.availability recorded MalwareBazaar and YARAify as skipped, limiting external-rule coverage.
- adversarialInputFlags.sandboxTextInjectionSuspected=true required the contaminated sandbox text to be excluded from consideration.
No malware cleanup is warranted from this evidence. Treat the file as potentially sensitive configuration material, source it only from an expected location, and keep endpoint protection enabled.
Coverage & freshness
Complete means the check returned a usable result. It does not mean the file is safe.
Antivirus
Complete0 of 75 engines flagged the file.
Sandbox
Complete1 isolated runtime environment contributed observations.
Network
Complete1 contacted host was cross-checked.
YARA
CompleteRule evaluation completed with no recorded matches.
External intel
PartialIndependent reference checks were attempted but are incomplete.
Behavior
Plain-English impact first, then the observed runtime evidence.
Runtime flight recorder
Capture complete- 1isolated sandbox run
- 4MITRE ATT&CK techniques
- 2spawned processes
- 1network contacts
- 12filesystem & mutex artifacts
What this file did when executed
This file was detonated in 1 sandbox and its runtime behaviour was observed.
Adversary techniques mapped to the MITRE ATT&CK framework.
- edge.ds-c7110-microsoft.global.dns.qwilted-cds.cqloud.com
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.keys
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.keys\OpenWithList
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER_Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\MuiCache\LangID
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER_Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\MuiCache\C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Acrobat Reader DC\Reader\AcroRd32.exe.FriendlyAppName
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER_Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\MuiCache\C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Acrobat Reader DC\Reader\AcroRd32.exe.ApplicationCompany
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER_Classes\Local Settings\Software\Microsoft\Windows\Shell\MuiCache\C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe.FriendlyAppName
- C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Caches
- C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer
- \Sessions\1\BaseNamedObjects\Global\SyncRootManager
- \Sessions\1\BaseNamedObjects\Local\SessionImmersiveColorMutex
- \Sessions\1\BaseNamedObjects\Global\C::Users:user:AppData:Local:Microsoft:Windows:Explorer:iconcache_idx.db!rwWriterMutex
- \Sessions\1\BaseNamedObjects\Global\C::Users:user:AppData:Local:Microsoft:Windows:Explorer:iconcache_16.db!dfMaintainer
- \Sessions\1\BaseNamedObjects\Global\C::Users:user:AppData:Local:Microsoft:Windows:Explorer:iconcache_32.db!dfMaintainer
Detection & Forensics
Consensus, attribution, signatures, code structure, prevalence, and identity.
Evidence integrity
Chain of custody for the facts preserved in this report.
- 0rule hits recorded
- 0 / 75engines flagged
- 2,420sources in submission history
Why these facts are shown
Each statement identifies whether it was directly recorded or derived from saved scan facts.
- 01
0 of 75 antivirus engines flagged the file.
Verdict inputView chapterProvenanceObservedSourceAntivirus analysisObserved at - 02
The hash has a long, established submission history across 2,420 sources.
Verdict inputView chapterProvenanceDerivedSourceSubmission historyObserved at - 03
One or more independent reference checks were incomplete or unavailable.
ProvenanceDerivedSourceExternal-intelligence coverageObserved at - 04
Scanned file: prod.keys — 039895c6e93a0c6208c3af27da8c3fc408083873a96f2320dc334a6fa252c112
ProvenanceObservedSourceUploaded fileObserved at - 05
Observed process — "C:\Windows\system32\cmd.exe" /c start /wait "" "C:\Users\<USER>\Desktop\prod _1_.keys"
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at - 06
Observed process — C:\Windows\System32\OpenWith.exe C:\Windows\system32\OpenWith.exe -Embedding
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at - 07
File written: Caches — C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Caches
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at - 08
File written: Explorer — C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Microsoft\Windows\Explorer
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at - 09
Contacted host: edge.ds-c7110-microsoft.global.dns.qwilted-cds.cqloud.com — Contact observed during runtime.
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at
Detection sources at a glance
The available sources did not agree on a named threat category.
Available reference checks returned no match, but at least one source was unavailable. This is not a clean result.
YARA rules
No matchesThe rule pass completed without a saved public match.
0 of 75 engines flagged this file
View all 75 engine results
PE structure
Not applicablePE structure analysis applies to Windows executable formats, not this file type.
How widely this file has been seen
Widely seen in the wild for a long time. High prior this is legitimate; isolated detections on common-old files are usually false positives.
Fingerprint and provenance
- File name
- prod.keys
- Format
- INI
- Code signing
- Not applicable to this file type
- Size
- 15.6 KB
- Last analyzed
- Oct 5, 2026, 5:22 AM UTC
039895c6e93a0c6208c3af27da8c3fc408083873a96f2320dc334a6fa252c112Safety & FAQ
Complete recovery guidance and answers for the next decision.
What to do now
This file appears low risk based on the evidence available now.
- Recovery step 01
Open it only when its sender or download source is one you independently trust.
- Recovery step 02
A clean result reduces known risk, but it cannot guarantee that every new or targeted threat has been detected.
- Recovery step 03
Keep your antivirus and Windows updates switched on so you stay protected.
Safety FAQ
Direct answers grounded in the saved verdict and evidence in this report.
Is prod.keys safe?
What is prod.keys?
How many antivirus engines detected prod.keys?
What is the SHA-256 hash of prod.keys?
Is it safe to open prod.keys?
How up to date is this analysis of prod.keys?
Community
Member reviews and reports for this exact file hash.