Hi, if set to 'Never remember history,' Firefox will accept cookies from sites and delete them when you close Firefox.

More - Settings for privacy, browsing history and do-not-track.

If your question is resolved by this or another answer, please take a minute to let us know. Thank you.

Scribe said

Hi, if set to 'Never remember history,' Firefox will accept cookies from sites and delete them when you close Firefox. More - Settings for privacy, browsing history and do-not-track. If your question is resolved by this or another answer, please take a minute to let us know. Thank you.

hi

thanks for the reply, however it doesnt answer my question.

when firefox is set to "remember history" and has google tracking cookies, then set to "never remember history" is those google tracking cookies still tracking?

When that session is open and you have a Google tracking cookie, then it's reasonable to assume that it's doing just that. As soon as you close Firefox that cookie will be deleted, but Google may create a new one when you use it again in another session.

Google has its finger in a lot of pies, but if it's Google search that you are concerned about, then I suggest you try Duck Duck Go which has a no tracking policy - Change your default search settings in Firefox.

For any more about Google's tracking policies, you will need to contact them.

Depending on how the Google cookies are implemented, https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/block-websites-storing-site-preferences#w_block-cookies-for-a-single-site might be sufficient (from Scribe's first link). I don't know what domain sets the cookie, but I'm sure it's easy enough to crawl through the set cookies and decide if blocking a domain would work.

hmm,

when firefox is open in "remember history" and has cookies stored, even if it is then set to "never remember" the cookies are still there and persist on firefox close unless they press clear. feel free to try it

if the cookies arnt cleared then they remain, which is what i was asking if the remaining cookies still have influence over the "never remember" sessions.

Interesting behaviour. So Firefox won't clear ALL cookies on exit/session close when Never Remember is selected? Just the fresh cookies set in the past session? This did come to mind, but I didn't think to test it, as Scribe said the cookies would get deleted.

I think this would be worth a look and making Never Remember actually clear up all cookies on exit if possible.

Phoxuponyou said

Interesting behaviour. So Firefox won't clear ALL cookies on exit/session close when Never Remember is selected? Just the fresh cookies set in the past session? This did come to mind, but I didn't think to test it, as Scribe said the cookies would get deleted. I think this would be worth a look and making Never Remember actually clear up all cookies on exit if possible.

exactly right, the cookies that were gained in "remember history" seem to persist when firefox is then set to "never remember" and closed.

you would think they would get cleared...but if they can still track / monitor the never remember session then it could raise privacy concerns..

if anyone knows the answer to the question above, specifically if leftover persisting cookies from "remember history" settings can indeed track "never remember" sessions, that would be great! :)

Jennifer

You have to leave private browsing mode temporarily to clear data like cookies and disk cache stored in a regular mode.

Firefox uses two independent cookie jars, one for normal mode and one for Private Browsing mode that is shared among all PB mode tabs and windows. During a PB mode session or in a PB mode window all cookies are kept in memory in a separate cookie jar just like other session data is kept in memory. Cookies saved in normal mode can't be accessed as they are stored in a different cookie jar. The PB mode cookie jar is cleared when all PB mode windows and tabs are closed.

cor-el said

You have to leave private browsing mode temporarily to clear data like cookies and disk cache stored in a regular mode. Firefox uses two independent cookie jars, one for normal mode and one for Private Browsing mode that is shared among all PB mode tabs and windows. During a PB mode session or in a PB mode window all cookies are kept in memory in a separate cookie jar just like other session data is kept in memory. Cookies saved in normal mode can't be accessed as they are stored in a different cookie jar. The PB mode cookie jar is cleared when all PB mode windows and tabs are closed.

so just to clarify, a google tracking cookie that was gained in normal mode, when firefox is then changed to "never remember" as its a seperate cookie jar the google tracking cookie from normal mode does not track the never remember session?

but it still remains on the drive, just not doing anything unless changed back to normal browsing.

Yes, that is OK. Firefox will create new cookies for each PB mode session, but a cookie from regular mode is never accessed and send to the server in a PB mode session.