Is setup.exe safe?
Twenty-five of 75 engines flagged this unsigned installer, with seven tier-1 detections and three high-trust engines independently identifying the Pomal trojan family.
The unsigned installer drew detections from 25 of 75 engines, including seven tier-1 engines. Microsoft, Ikarus, and TrendMicro independently identified Pomal, while runtime evidence mapped activity to process injection and token manipulation. Keep endpoint protection enabled and do not run the file.
07ca3c66a9aae4f8c7…5a9c2687b8d526Recommended next actions
Before installing
Do not install it. Delete this file from the device, then empty the Recycle Bin or Trash.
If you already installed it
Disconnect from the internet, start a full or offline antivirus scan, then secure important accounts from a clean device.
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.
The unsigned installer drew detections from 25 of 75 engines, including seven tier-1 engines. Microsoft, Ikarus, and TrendMicro independently identified Pomal, while runtime evidence mapped activity to process injection and token manipulation. Keep endpoint protection enabled and do not run the file.
The strongest evidence is a three-engine tier-1 consensus naming Pomal, within 25 detections across 75 engines. Seven high-trust engines flagged the executable, so this is not a low-trust-only or isolated heuristic pattern. One sandbox run mapped activity to T1055 process injection and T1134 access-token manipulation, although it did not assign an explicit malicious verdict. The file is unsigned and has no established publisher history to counterbalance those findings. Host-cache and child-file checks produced no confirmed malicious result, but the children remained unclassified and those points do not outweigh the direct antivirus consensus.
What We Detected
Twenty-five of 75 antivirus engines flagged the executable. Seven tier-1 engines detected it, and Microsoft, Ikarus, and TrendMicro independently named the Pomal family, meeting the strong family-consensus threshold. Other engines used generic trojan, crack, or riskware labels.
Threat Behavior
One completed sandbox run mapped activity to MITRE T1055, associated with process injection, and T1134, associated with access-token manipulation. No explicit malicious sandbox verdict was recorded. The only observed domain was checked against the host cache without a malicious or suspicious match, while all 10 dropped children remained unclassified rather than confirmed clean.
What To Do Now
Do not execute the installer. Quarantine or remove it while keeping antivirus and endpoint protection enabled. If it already ran, perform a full system scan and review active processes and account activity from a trusted environment.
Where this verdict could be wrong5 caveats
- Nine tier-1 engines reported no detection, including Avast, Avira, BitDefender, and AVG.
- behaviour.hasMaliciousSandboxVerdict=false, and droppedChildren.hasMaliciousChild=false; however, all 10 inspected children have unknown verdicts.
- contactedHosts.inspected=1 covered the one observed domain and returned no malicious or suspicious cache matches.
- externalIntel.yaraify.ruleCount=0 and externalIntel.circl.hit=false, so no researcher-rule or CIRCL corroboration was available.
- Two of five imphash-only similar files previously received safe verdicts, demonstrating that this imphash is not uniquely associated with malware.
These are the assessment's weak points. If you believe one applies to your file, report the verdict and we'll re-review it.
- Nine tier-1 engines reported no detection
- contactedHosts.inspected=1 found no cached malicious or suspicious match
- droppedChildren.hasMaliciousChild=false
- behaviour.hasMaliciousSandboxVerdict=false
- externalIntel.yaraify.ruleCount=0
- 25/75 antivirus detections
- Seven tier-1 malicious detections
- Strong three-engine tier-1 Pomal consensus
- Unsigned Win32 executable
- Runtime mapping to T1055 process injection
- Runtime mapping to T1134 access-token manipulation
Quarantine or delete the file and do not run it. If execution already occurred, keep protection enabled, perform a full scan, and investigate the affected system for unauthorized processes or account activity.
Coverage & freshness
Complete means the check returned a usable result. It does not mean the file is safe.
Antivirus
Complete25 of 75 engines flagged the file.
Sandbox
Complete1 isolated runtime environment contributed observations.
Network
Complete1 contacted host was cross-checked.
YARA
Complete1 signature or behavior rule matched.
External intel
Complete3 of 3 independent reference sources completed.
Behavior
Plain-English impact first, then the observed runtime evidence.
Runtime flight recorder
Capture complete- 1isolated sandbox run
- 15MITRE ATT&CK techniques
- 3spawned processes
- 1network contacts
- 19filesystem & mutex artifacts
What this file does
Observed actions and their security significance
High concern: Injected code into another process, a technique that can conceal execution.
Moderate concern: Contained obfuscated or packed code that makes inspection harder.
Moderate concern: Runs hidden system commands (script or shell).
Moderate concern: Communicated over a common application protocol; malware can use this for command-and-control.
Moderate concern: Scans through your files and folders.
Moderate concern: Checked the environment for virtualisation or analysis tools.
Note: Reads your Windows user-account details.
These are observed capabilities from an isolated analysis. A technique does not prove malicious intent on its own, and the file never ran on your device.
Threat context
How trojans work
A trojan disguises itself as something useful or harmless to trick you into running it. Once open, it does its real job in the background — anything from stealing data to opening a back door or downloading more malware.
Bottom line:The disguise is the whole trick, so a trustworthy-looking name or icon means nothing.
Attack story
Runtime observations grouped by analysis stage. Arrows organize the stages; they do not claim chronology or causality.
Input file
The submitted object
- FileObserved
setup.exe
07ca3c66a9aae4f8c7dbf49254ead1de3497559c654489ade15a9c2687b8d526
01Uploaded file
Processes
Runtime execution
- ProcessObserved
Observed process
C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-IB6DE.tmp\setup.tmp /SL5=$80162,4952535,140800,C:\Users\<USER>\Downloads\setup.exe
02Isolated runtime analysis - ProcessObserved
Observed process
"C:\Users\user\Desktop\file.exe"
03Isolated runtime analysis - +1 more recorded observation in Analyst mode
Files
Created or changed
- Written fileObserved
setup.tmp
C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-IB6DE.tmp\setup.tmp
04Isolated runtime analysis - Written fileObserved
_setup64.tmp
C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-9538T.tmp\_isetup\_setup64.tmp
05Isolated runtime analysis - +1 more recorded observation in Analyst mode
Network
Hosts contacted
- Contacted hostObserved
eip-terr-na.cdp1.digicert.com.akahost.net
Contact observed during runtime.
06Isolated runtime analysis
6 recorded facts from one runtime window. Every fact remains independently traceable in Analyst mode.
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.
- eip-terr-na.cdp1.digicert.com.akahost.net
- Software\Microsoft\RestartManager\Session0000\Owner
- Software\Microsoft\RestartManager\Session0000\SessionHash
- Software\Microsoft\RestartManager\Session0000\Sequence
- HKEY_USERS\S-1-5-21-4270068108-2931534202-3907561125-1001\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\FileExts\.exe\OpenWithProgids\exefile
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\RestartManager
- HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\RestartManager\Session0000
- C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-IB6DE.tmp\setup.tmp
- C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-9538T.tmp\_isetup\_setup64.tmp
- C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-9538T.tmp\_isetup\_shfoldr.dll
- C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-9538T.tmp\idp.dll
- C:\Users\user\AppData\Local\Temp\is-8M9KF.tmp
- \Sessions\1\BaseNamedObjects\Local\RstrMgr3887CAB8-533F-4C85-B0DC-3E5639F8D511
- \Sessions\1\BaseNamedObjects\Local\RstrMgr-3887CAB8-533F-4C85-B0DC-3E5639F8D511-Session0000
- \Sessions\1\BaseNamedObjects\Local\DirectSound DllMain mutex (0x00001B3C)
- \Sessions\1\BaseNamedObjects\DirectSound Administrator shared thread array (lock
Files this sample writes at runtime
This file drops 10 children at runtime. None are currently flagged malicious in our cache.
- 09af8004b85478e1eca0…47b449Never scannednever seen before
- a4c86fc4836ac728d7bd…95fd81Never scannednever seen before
- 9884e9d1b4f8a873ccbd…360d87Never scannednever seen before
- f4fc0187491a9cb89e23…bc44bbNever scannednever seen before
- df9f56c4da160101567b…8acf15Never scannednever seen before
- 68f42a7823ed7ee88a5c…aa172dNever scannednever seen before
- a4cc6683393795f7b84d…ffe0b8Never scannednever seen before
- c652b4b564b3c85c3991…412c74Never scannednever seen before
- 1099609718f22cc3592d…072b87Never scannednever seen before
- 450b9b0ba25bf068afbc…fd0105Never scannednever seen before
Detection & Forensics
Consensus, attribution, signatures, code structure, prevalence, and identity.
Evidence integrity
Chain of custody for the facts preserved in this report.
- 1rule hit recorded
- 25 / 75engines flagged
- 2,130sources in submission history
Why these facts are shown
Each statement identifies whether it was directly recorded or derived from saved scan facts.
- 01
1 high-confidence signature or behavior rule matched this file.
Verdict inputView chapterProvenanceDerivedSourceSignature and behavior rulesObserved at - 02
25 of 75 antivirus engines flagged the file, including alibabacloud and Bkav.
Verdict inputView chapterProvenanceObservedSourceAntivirus analysisObserved at - 03
The hash has been submitted 2,639 times from 2,130 sources.
ProvenanceDerivedSourceSaved report factsObserved at - 04
Scanned file: setup.exe — 07ca3c66a9aae4f8c7dbf49254ead1de3497559c654489ade15a9c2687b8d526
ProvenanceObservedSourceUploaded fileObserved at - 05
Observed process — C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-IB6DE.tmp\setup.tmp /SL5=$80162,4952535,140800,C:\Users\<USER>\Downloads\setup.exe
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at - 06
Observed process — "C:\Users\user\Desktop\file.exe"
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at - 07
File written: setup.tmp — C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-IB6DE.tmp\setup.tmp
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at - 08
File written: _setup64.tmp — C:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-9538T.tmp\_isetup\_setup64.tmp
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at - 09
Contacted host: eip-terr-na.cdp1.digicert.com.akahost.net — Contact observed during runtime.
ProvenanceObservedSourceIsolated runtime analysisObserved at
Detection sources at a glance
Category: generic-trojan
MalwareBazaar, YARAify, and CIRCL hashlookup completed and returned no entries for this hash.
Signatures and behavior heuristics
A community signature or high-severity behavioral heuristic matched. Signatures identify known patterns; heuristics are strong leads but are not proof on their own.
The saved runtime evidence maps this activity to MITRE T1055 (Process Injection). The mapping supports possible process injection, but it does not prove the exact injection method or the operator's intent.
EvidenceC:\Users\<USER>\AppData\Local\Temp\is-IB6DE.tmp\setup.tmp /SL5=$80162,4952535,140800,C:\Users\<USER>\Downloads\setup.exe
25 of 75 engines flagged this file
View all 75 engine results
Section entropy & packers
No high-entropy executable section or known packer signature was detected. Data and resource sections can still have high entropy without indicating packed code.
How widely this file has been seen
Moderate prevalence — neither rare nor common. No strong prior applies.
Fingerprint and provenance
- File name
- setup.exe
- Format
- Win32 EXE
- Code signing
- No verified publisher
- Size
- 5.3 MB
- Last analyzed
- Oct 1, 2026, 3:35 AM UTC
07ca3c66a9aae4f8c7dbf49254ead1de3497559c654489ade15a9c2687b8d526Safety & FAQ
Complete recovery guidance and answers for the next decision.
What to do now
This file is dangerous. Treat it as harmful and remove it.
- Recovery step 01
Don't install this file. Delete this file from the device, then empty the Recycle Bin or Trash.
- Recovery step 02
If you already installed it, disconnect from the internet and start with a full antivirus scan or Microsoft Defender Offline scan. If compromise is suspected or the problem persists, use a reputable second-opinion scanner and follow incident-recovery or clean-reinstall guidance.
- Recovery step 03
If you typed any passwords while it was open, change them from a device you trust.
- Recovery step 04
Download a fresh installer from the developer's official site or an official app store.
Safety FAQ
Direct answers grounded in the saved verdict and evidence in this report.
Is setup.exe a virus?
What is setup.exe?
How many antivirus engines detected setup.exe?
What should I do if I already installed setup.exe?
How do I remove setup.exe?
What kind of malware is setup.exe?
What is the SHA-256 hash of setup.exe?
How up to date is this analysis of setup.exe?
Community
Member reviews and reports for this exact file hash.