# Firefox tosses its cookies **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [March 12, 2009, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170 "2009-03-12T05:39:53Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 16\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2009, 5:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/1 "2009-03-12T05:39:53Z")
I have the latest and greatest Firefox installed on my Vista laptop. Lately, it has developed the habit of forgetting all its cookies when it is closed. My home page is My Yahoo! and I have to re-log in every time. I have to log in for SDMB and every other board I read. It doesn’t even remember the CNN edition I prefer. I have the browser set to accept cookies. This is a recent development. All I can think to do is uninstall and reinstall Firefox, but I would prefer not to go to the trouble. Anyone have any idea why Firefox would suddenly decide to toss my cookies? ---
**Author:** ![Reply](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/reply/32/15952_2.png) [@Reply](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Reply)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2009, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/2 "2009-03-12T06:03:22Z")
Check your Tools -\> Clear Private Data options and make sure cookies aren’t check. Also, did you recently install any extensions, especially cookie-related ones? ---
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2009, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/3 "2009-03-12T06:12:03Z")
Yeah, thought of those things. It is set to accept cookies. Clear Private Data when exiting is unchecked. Even if it were checked, cookies is unchecked, so they shouldn’t go away. Weird. No extensions have been installed lately. ---
**Author:** ![ShibbOleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/848f3c/32.png) [@ShibbOleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ShibbOleth)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2009, 6:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/4 "2009-03-12T06:35:07Z")
No ideas, but great thread title. ---
**Author:** ![Khadaji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2009, 12:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/5 "2009-03-12T12:02:22Z")
I have the same problem. Cookies disappear regularly. I haven’t figured out why or even a pattern. Some times it will go a week or more, some times just a few days and yesterday I seemed to loose them several times. ---
**Author:** ![Turble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Turble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turble)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2009, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/6 "2009-03-12T14:51:13Z")
I’ve been having the same thing. Just now checked the Firefox site and there is a new version. Firefox 3.0.7 fixes several issues found in Firefox 3.0.6: For some users, cookies would appear to go “missing” after a few days (bug 444600). Aha! ---
**Author:** ![Khadaji](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Khadaji](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khadaji)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2009, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/7 "2009-03-12T15:01:16Z")
Alas, I already have 3.0.7. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2009, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/8 "2009-03-12T15:54:54Z")
I still have the old FireFox, I don’t like tabbed browsing. ---
**Author:** ![BorgHunter](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/7c8e57/32.png) [@BorgHunter](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BorgHunter)\ **Post date:** [March 12, 2009, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/9 "2009-03-12T20:17:01Z")
> [@DrDeth](#): > > I still have the old FireFox, I don’t like tabbed browsing. Firefox had tabbed browsing even when it was known as Phoenix, back in 2002. ---
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/10 "2009-03-13T01:43:27Z")
I too am running Firefox 3.0.7. Bummer. ---
**Author:** ![Manduck](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/manduck/32/256_2.png) [@Manduck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Manduck)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/11 "2009-03-13T02:30:02Z")
This may be way too obvious, but nobody’s mentioned it yet: In Tools|Options|Privacy, make sure you have cookies set to “Keep until they expire”, not “Keep until I close Firefox” ---
**Author:** ![Drum\_God](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/drum_god/32/44_2.png) [@Drum\_God](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Drum_God)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/12 "2009-03-13T02:35:18Z")
I think I found a solution! (I’m running Vista Home Premium 32-bit) Go to Start and in the search box, type: %APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles This will bring up a profile. Open that profile. Find the cookies.sqlite file and delete it. Firefox will need to be closed before deleting it. Reopen Firefox and log into SDMB or whatever. Remember to put a checkmark in the “Remember Me” box. Close Firefox and restart it to see if the problem is solved. I am tentatively saying that this has solved my problem. The cookies file somehow became corrupted. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 2:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/13 "2009-03-13T02:48:07Z")
> [@BorgHunter](#): > > Firefox had tabbed browsing even when it was known as Phoenix, back in 2002. Mine does not, although apparently I can choose that as an option. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 6:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/14 "2009-03-13T18:07:45Z")
YAYYYY IT WORKED Thank you, **Drum God** , thank you! 🙂 > [@Drum\_God](#): > > I think I found a solution! > > (I’m running Vista Home Premium 32-bit) > > Go to Start and in the search box, type: %APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles > This will bring up a profile. Open that profile. Find the cookies.sqlite file and delete it. Firefox will need to be closed before deleting it. Reopen Firefox and log into SDMB or whatever. Remember to put a checkmark in the “Remember Me” box. Close Firefox and restart it to see if the problem is solved. > > I am tentatively saying that this has solved my problem. The cookies file somehow became corrupted. ---
**Author:** ![mhendo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mhendo/32/3159_2.png) [@mhendo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mhendo)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/15 "2009-03-13T18:18:44Z")
For those who are interested in seeing how all this stuff is stored, and who would like to be able to manage it a bit more closely, you can install the [SQLite Manager addon](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/5817) for Firefox. For those who don’t know, basically many of Firefox’s internals are stored in, and controlled by, a database system. For example, the file **cookies.sqlite** is a little database that stores the information about each cookie. There are others for downloads, permissions, search, bookmarks, etc. With the SQLite Manager, you can view these databases, and delete (or add) entries. You can also delete the whole database, in cases where it has become corrupted. Just be careful you don’t mess around too much if you’re not sure what you’re doing, or you could end up deleting all your cookies, or your bookmarks, or something like that. ---
**Author:** ![The\_Composer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/898d66/32.png) [@The\_Composer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Composer)\ **Post date:** [March 13, 2009, 6:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/firefox-tosses-its-cookies/489170/16 "2009-03-13T18:21:35Z")
Forgive me for posting this in your thread, **Drum God** , but I was having a similar issue where certain pages do not refresh on each visit, especially news sites. Have any of you run into this? Is there a solution (besides F5 every time I go to the site)? I did change the about:config setting to always refresh on every load, but that seems to make the pages take longer to open.