I am being asked for primary password which does not work (Thunderbird)
To whom it may concern.
As you can see I cannot login to my TBird account when using TBird to access my emails on the server that the company uses for emails. (Win PC) But I am able to login to the server using Web-mail on the same PC (Windows) using the same master password. I have been able to setup TBird Linux based PC but I needed to go through a manual configuration. Did not pick the password authorization automatically, I needed to setup manually. I repeated the above process, and I have been also been to setup TBird on a Laptop (Linux= Xubuntu 20.04 LTS) successfully. All of this was, after talking to one of the support personnel at the host-provider, because I thought that the original problem was the host-provider's problem, but it seems not. Proven by the fact that I can now access the data by Web-mail, and other (Linux) PCes using TBird. I could re-install / re-setup as I did on the Linux PCes, but I have various add-ons that I will need to install. But the main problem is that I have several local folders that I wish to keep, these contain valuable older years data and I do not what to lose access to this data. Sorry about the long question but the data is my companies data. Best Wishes Jim
All Replies (3)
re :I am being asked for primary password which does not work ....But I am able to login to the server using Web-mail on the same PC (Windows) using the same master password.
You seem confused. The 'Primary Password (otherwise known as Master Password) is not the mail account password.
Mail account password is set up/modified etc via the webmail account and is used to logon to the webmail account. Once this has been done that same password is set up in Thunderbird for that particular mail account so it can access the server.
The 'Primary Password' has nothing to do with mail accounts. It is set up in Thunderbird and it's purpose is to prevent any other person who has access to your computer and your User Account on that computer to being able to see your stored mail account passwords.
The 'Primary Password' would not be the same as any of your mail account passwords for very obvious reasons. This is where the 'Primary Password' was set up: In Thunderbird Menu icon > Settings (or Preferences) > Privacy & Security Scroll down to 'Passwords' section Is the 'Use a Primary Password' checkbox selected ? If yes, then you would have done this as it not set by default. You cannot simply uncheck it because that also requires the Primary Password.
If you are being asked specifically for a 'Primary Password' and you have forgotten it and need to clear it, follow the instructions below to remove it completely.
Please note: the purpose of the 'Primary Password' is to protect your stored mail account passwords, so when the Primary Password is cleared, all your stored mail account passwords will also be removed. This means after restarting Thunderbird you will get a prompt for a password for the account so it can access server and that password is the same one you use to logon to webmail account.
Info here:
I've added an image below as a guide. In Error Console - click on 'bin' icon to clear it Copy the entire line - all of it: openDialog("chrome://pippki/content/resetpassword.xhtml") Paste it the section after the >> chevons and press Enter on keyboard. Then click on the 'Reset' button
Finally exit Thunderbird - wait a few moments for background processes to complete then restart Thunderbird.
Thunderbird will prompt for mail account password (same as one used to access webmail) REmember to select the checkbox to Remember Password and then clickon OK
Hi Toad-Hall,
Thanks for the reply. Your comment :- You seem confused. The 'Primary Password (otherwise known as Master Password) is not the mail account password.
I was only following some advice on the internet that equated the primary password to the login password.
But if the primary password is related what used to be called "master password" in security section. To the best of knowledge, I have not setup that up in TBird whereas I have set up in Firefox. I have using TBird for many years and I have not found a need to set the primary password up. So it seems that possibly some corruption occurred on the Hard Drive?? This problem, all, started when I was unable to login to my email provider and setting up the webmail access was all part of identifying the problem and entailed resetting the login password to my provider. I also setup TBird on another PC and this where I am sending this message from.
I will be following your information and removing the primary password. I will send an update once I have finished.
Best Wishes & Thanks again Jim
Removing the primary password will delete any stored passwords, as mentioned in the KB article.