Do you know how the passwords were lost?

Look on your desktop. Do you see a folder called; Old Firefox?

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/recovering-important-data-from-an-old-profile

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/back-and-restore-information-firefox-profiles

Your passwords are stored in the key3.db and logins.json files.

Firefox 32 and later builds store the passwords in the logins.json file in the profile folder and no longer use the key3.db and signons.sqlite files. You can force Firefox to reimport the passwords from the signons.sqlite file.

• reset the signon.importedFromSqlite pref on the about:config page to the default value via the right-click context menu
• delete the logins.json file in the Firefox profile folder with Firefox closed

When you restart Firefox then you should have the signon.importedFromSqlite pref with the value set to true and you should have the passwords imported in the Password Manager unless there may have been errors.

You can use this button to go to the currently used Firefox profile folder: Help > Troubleshooting Information > Profile Directory: Show Folder (Linux: Open Directory; Mac: Show in Finder)

Hi Fred, Nothing on the desktop. The 2nd part of your suggestion is exactly what I tried before asking the question (my original question states this), I had read quite a few posts that all recommended the same method, unfortunately it didn't work in my case, hence the question.

Unless they ended up in the computers recycle bin . . . . . . .

In the event that the passwords information is lost, you should record all information in a separate text file somewhere else on your hard drive, or written down. You can easily copy and paste if you need to do so. If you are concerned about someone else looking at that file, you can compress it using a password.

These can't get your data back, but will help in the future.

These add-ons can be a great help by backing up and restoring Firefox

FEBE (Firefox Environment Backup Extension) {web link} FEBE allows you to quickly and easily backup your Firefox extensions, history, passwords, and more. In fact, it goes beyond just backing up -- It will actually rebuild your saved files individually into installable .xpi files. It will also make backup of files that you choose.

OPIE {web link} Import/Export extension preferences

Thanks for your reply Fred. Nothing in the recycle bin either. The odd thing is that the newly -recreated login.json file seems to populated with password/login type information. If the sqlite file was corrupted, I would assume that it wouldn't be able to recreate the login.json file. Obviously, I am not going to post either file here, but perhaps somebody from mozilla could tell me what to look for in an uncorrupted file so that I could check both files myself.

I decided to instal Lastpass, which imported most, but not all, of my passwords. The few that it didn't find shouldn't be too hard to reset.

Good luck. Remember to record your passwords. Most site login pages have a "lost password" link.

Note that on Mac you may also have a backup of logins.json and key3.db in the Time Machine if you use it.

Thank you both for your comments.