Despite folks thinking differently the master password is used to encrypt the user password file. Nothing else. That it appears later in the load process now is not a change that changes any design functionality. Just the loading of the program occurs faster than in the past.

You operating system has account passwords to protect your data from prying eyes.

Thanks for your quick answer. Ok, I agree, the Master Password just protects the other passwords saved in Thunderbird.

But anyway, before the update, it was a nice workaround though and worked for me as an additional security for my private e-mails in the office (no Master Password > no access to Thunderbird).

Sure there is an operating system password to protect unauthorized access generally, but there are colleagues in my team which have to use my computer sometimes for a specific task. So in the team, this computer has to be accessable, but not my private e-mails.

Hope there will be a working add-on soon (like StartupMaster which is currently not compatible with version 68.4.1).

Or have you or somebody else some suggestion for my situation?

http://kb.mozillazine.org/Protect_the_profiles_contents

ponci said

(no Master Password > no access to Thunderbird).

As secure as pressing the escape key to remove the dialog. That was all it took.

Sure there is an operating system password to protect unauthorized access generally, but there are colleagues in my team which have to use my computer sometimes for a specific task. So in the team, this computer has to be accessable, but not my private e-mails.

Then I suggest you create another user account on the system and use user switching to give them access, just not to your account.

Hope there will be a working add-on soon (like StartupMaster which is currently not compatible with version 68.4.1).

See the faq about startup master. http://htamas.ces.hu/startupmaster/webext.html

One thing you will note is that the bugs mentioned are not really about profile passwords. but https://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=1361838 is probably most telling. Mozilla basically are refusing a patch to make it work, but as it is the startup master author that filed it, the initial comments explain the situation nicely.