Join the AMA (Ask Me Anything) with the Firefox leadership team to celebrate Firefox 20th anniversary and discuss Firefox’s future on Mozilla Connect. Mark your calendar on Thursday, November 14, 18:00 - 20:00 UTC!

This site will have limited functionality while we undergo maintenance to improve your experience. If an article doesn't solve your issue and you want to ask a question, we have our support community waiting to help you at @FirefoxSupport on Twitter and/r/firefox on Reddit.

Search Support

Avoid support scams. We will never ask you to call or text a phone number or share personal information. Please report suspicious activity using the “Report Abuse” option.

Learn More

Could not initialise the application's security component

  • 2 respostas
  • 10 have this problem
  • 1 view
  • Last reply by phoebegrant

more options

When opening Firefox, I get a message "Could not initialise the application's security component. The most probable cause is problems with files in your browser's profile directory. Please check that this directory has no read/write restrictions and your hard drive is not full or close to full. It is recommended that you exit the browser and fix the problem. If you continue to use this browser session, you might see incorrect browser behaviour when accessing security features." Firefox then opens but all tabs are marked New Tab and no access can be obtained to the various websites. If I try to sign in to Google, a new window opens marked About:blank. I have wireless connection which is functioning correctly. Please help get my connection working if possible.

When opening Firefox, I get a message "Could not initialise the application's security component. The most probable cause is problems with files in your browser's profile directory. Please check that this directory has no read/write restrictions and your hard drive is not full or close to full. It is recommended that you exit the browser and fix the problem. If you continue to use this browser session, you might see incorrect browser behaviour when accessing security features." Firefox then opens but all tabs are marked New Tab and no access can be obtained to the various websites. If I try to sign in to Google, a new window opens marked About:blank. I have wireless connection which is functioning correctly. Please help get my connection working if possible.

All Replies (2)

more options
more options

Thank you for this detailed explanation - I suspected the answer would be somewhere although I certainly had trouble locating it.

I haven't utilised this answer as I resurrected another laptop and copied folders from the AppData Local and Roaming folders and pasted them into my corrupted machine, which is now working well. However, I am extremely grateful to you for coming to my aid and have bookmarked the reply should it fail again.

I see someone else has the same problem, so your help will doubtless reach even further. Regards