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

Why Firefox emptied the cookie's files instead of deleted them

  • 6 replies
  • 1 has this problem
  • 4 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

more options

My Firebox settings is : accept the cookies for the session only. At the end of each session the cookies per se are deleted which is fine but the cookies files remain as empty files (0 k). Why ? I have to use a third party (Like CCleaner) to delete those files.

My Firebox settings is : accept the cookies for the session only. At the end of each session the cookies per se are deleted which is fine but the cookies files remain as empty files (0 k). Why ? I have to use a third party (Like CCleaner) to delete those files.

All Replies (6)

more options

Hi jiembe, do you mean the cookies.sqlite database file? I suppose it is retained for efficiency. Are you concerned that someone could perform a data recovery on the file to extract the cookies it used to contain?

Maybe you're referring to some other files. Could you describe them in more detail?

more options

I assume that you are referring to a report from CCleaner about these cookie files?

Firefox uses one cookies.sqlite file to store the cookies like posted above and doesn't have separate file like MS browser might use, but there are other types of storage that CCleaner might place under cookies that are causing the confusion.

more options

I get this report from CCleaner

more options

I don't know what "0 Ko" is meant to mean. And these cookies are removed if you delete the cookies.sqllite file and then have CCleaner scan again? Or are you letting CCleaner delete whatever it wants, not specific to a particular file?

CCleaner counts data related to secure connections in the SiteSecurityServiceState.txt as "cookies" and Firefox does not. See: https://support.mozilla.org/questions/1213050

more options

The content of SiteSecurityServiceState.txt is not referenced in the CCleaner list above. I haven't try delete the cookies.sqllite file since I have some cookies I had accepted as permanent. So I used instead CCleaner to clear those "cookies" and the time of the 'last modified file date' of cookies.sqllite haven't change.

more options

This could be about local storage as saved in the storage/default folder in the profile folder. The browser-extension-data is where extensions store its data.

You can use the button on the "Help -> Troubleshooting Information" (about:support) page to go to the current Firefox profile folder or use the about:profiles page.