Clear Firefox 3 Browsing History, Cache and Private Data
Oct 1st, 2008 by MrGroove
My last few articles focused on How-To Clear IE7 Browser History. I figured while I’m in a “Security” frame of mind, I would capture the same process for Mozilla Firefox. Like IE7, the process in Firefox is extremely easy. Personally, since you can also automate the process and have Firefox clear the cached data automatically each time you close the Firefox browser I think it’s even better than IE’s process. Yes yes yes, I know you can also configure IE to clear Temporary files on close but, from my testing that’s all it does whereas Firefox gives you more options and it’s configurable to clear cookies, history etc… after you close Firefox. Anyway, enough talk… let’s get to it!
First let’s look at the MANUAL way to Clear Browsing History and Private Data in Firefox:
1. Open Firefox and Click Tools, Clear Private Data…
TIP: You can also use the Keyboard Shortcuts and by Pressing Ctrl+Shift+Del with Firefox open
2. Check any or all items you want to clear / delete. Click Clear Private Data Now and YOUR DONE!
Now let’s review the How-To configure Firefox to Clear the Browsing History, Cache, Cookies etc… each time you close the Firefox browser.
3. Click Tools, Options
4. Click the Privacy Tab, Check Box Always clear my private data when I close Firefox then Click Settings under Private Data to configure WHAT to clear
5. Click Each box / item you want to Delete as shown below then Click OK to Continue then OK Again to Save.
Tip: Personally, for maximum privacy I always delete the Cache, Cookies and Browsing History at a minimum but this is all just personal preference / level of security consciousness / paranoia 
That’s it! Next time you close your browser you will be prompted to delete all the various items (history, cache, cookies etc…) which you configured. BTW - If you don’t want to be prompted, just UNCHECK the box “Ask me before clearing private data” on the Privacy Tab as shown in Step 4.
As normal, please be GROOVY and leave any comments or feedback here. Please post Technical Questions Related or not in the Forum!
Tags: firefox, privacy, security, clear-history
what about cntrl-shift-del?
@babybox - look under #1. mrgroove included the ctrl+shift+del short cut-keys in his “tip”.
or did you have a question about the short-cut keys?
Great tip! I didn’t like the ‘are you sure’ prompts so i disabled that. thanks
exactly what i was looking for! great screen shots! thanks mrgroove!
@babybox - get your question answered?
@shannon-y & andys - Thanks for the Feedback on the How To Tutorial! I agree, I don’t like the Prompts either however I do like to know if the history in Firefox is actually cleared or not. Sometimes I fat finger the keys so I’m not 100% sure unless I get the prompt.
Either way, I’m glad you enjoyed the How-To!
Hi Mr. Groove, but even after doing all these, the history is still there! Anyway out of this?
Thanks!
@Kakiayam,
That’s really odd. Are you running Firefox 3.x? Your trying to clear you browsing history right?
Try this. Open Firefox and hit a few sites. In the Command Menu, Click History. You should see your browsing history. Click out of it and use the Keyboard Shortcut to Clear the Firefox history - Ctrl+Shift+Delete. You should be prompted to delete the cookies, history temp files etc… Be sure the Check Box for Browsing History is checked (it’s the first check box) then Click Clear Private Data Now.
Now Click on History again on the Command Bar. Is the history gone? Let us know!
Friends: After doing all these will the system have any files stored anywhere hidden??or if we uninstall the firefox will it keep any data in the system anywhere?If not why there are products in market to delete Temporary Internet files???can anyone explain me, i dont know much about these….Thanks in advance
@Riya - Hi Riya and Welcome to the site!
To answer your question, when you use the process above, I can confirm that it does a pretty good job of deleting all the Cache, Cookies, etc.. from Firefox 3.x. If you want to verify all the files are gone, just type the following into the Firefox URL Bar:
about:cache
This command will show you not only show what you have cached in Memory, Disk and Offline Cache but it also provides the directory where the cache is stored on disk. On my machine for example (Windows Server 2008), the cache data is stored here:
C:\Users\mrgroove\AppData\Local\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles\8l03zey5.default\Cache
Now don’t forget, a file DELETE is only as good as a file DELETE. I’m guessing they are simply DELETING the files rather than WIPING them (being that the delete happens so quickly). So, if your looking to WIPE your drive then you will need to find some sort of WIPING program (I use PGP) and manually WIPE the files 3-10 times from the drive once you determine where you Disk cache is being stored using the About:Cache command above.
MrGroove
@kakiayam
BTW - you can also try the about:cache command and manually nuke the history/cache
Thank you so much for ur reply……i did all these to clear my history……….Thank you so much Mr.groove
@Riya - Excellent! Any further questions, plz feel free to use our Free Tech Support Community - http://www.groovypost.com/forum/. It’s an easier way to ask for and receive help on any IT subject!
Thanks!
Thank you Mr. Groove. I did clear all my browsing history. I guess I mistook the bookmark for browsing history. For example, when I type “www”, all links in the bookmark which starts with that will be displayed. And I mistook that as browsing history…hehe…
Thanks again!
Have a good day ahead.
KakiAyam
@KaKiaYam - Good news! Glad to hear your all fixed up!
followed all the steps for clearing history in Firefox (I think mine is 3) but the URLs are still in the dropdown box I’ve checked several sites for answers, and am still stumped. Any new things to try? Thanks,
KF
@Kayfranks - Yes…. Very annoying “FEATURE” in Firefox 3. Mozilla updated the Navigation bar (Now it’s called “AwesomeBar” and that’s one of the new FEATURES.
I just answered this question in our groovyPost Community Forum - http://www.groovypost.com/forum/internet-browsers/cannot-clear-cache-in-firefox-3-0-4-t95552.html#p95663
Look towards the end of the first post for instructions on how to remove those links. Feel free to reply to my post there if you have any further questions or create a new topic if you need help with something else.
Thanks!
I have firefox 3 and have tried everything but it won’t allow me to dlete my browsing history on the toolbar in which you type the website name.
@Clueless - Take a look at Comment #16 above. Should fix what your looking for.
To hide the history in the URL bar:
- enter about:config (to the URL bar)
- look for browser.urlbar.maxRichResults, double-click and enter 0 (the default is 12)
You wrote a great article with perfect pictorial instructions, (which *should* be common sense) but doing the above doesn’t let me clear my cache. (Really, I even rebooted my system, not just Firefox. Further, I uninstalled & reinstalled Firefox 3.0 but it ‘remembered’ my add-on’s, cache & even my history, too. Do I need to uninstall /install as v2.0 again? *Any* suggestion would be very welcome. Thanks again!
@Joseph - Thank you for the comments and Welcome to groovyPost! In regards to your question regarding your firefox cache, take a look here:
http://www.groovypost.com/forum/internet-browsers/cannot-clear-cache-in-firefox-3-0-4-t95552.html where we had a good conversation.
You should also search our forum here:
http://www.groovypost.com/forum/search.php as there has been quite a bit of discussion about this in our free groovy Community Forum.
Comments Closed
Please direct all future questions and comments to the following Discussion Topic created for this Article:
http://www.groovypost.com/forum/internet-browsers/clear-firefox-3-browsing-history-or-cache-t95603.html#p95924
This way the entire Groovy Community can assist you!
Thank you!