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How to keep tracking protection/privacy on whenever I open?

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Several weeks ago when FireFox updated, every time I opened the browser and every time I opened a window it automatically opened with a screen showing the purple private browsing icon at the top and the page itself showed Privacy Tracking - On. I loved that. Today, after updating to 48.0.2 it no longer does not. I have spent the past hour searching the web. I know how to turn on private browsing (Tools > Option > Privacy > History > change the "FireFox will" field to "Use custom..." and check the, "Always use private..." box). The problem is once I close and reopen the browser the settings are lost. Once I open a new tab, the settings are lost. So, how do I get back what I had (purple Private Browsing icon and screen saying Privacy Tracking - On)? How do I keep the Private Browsing and Privacy Protection permanently on? As is when I make the change the setting is lost when I close and reopen the browser. I have tried this with and without signing on.

Several weeks ago when FireFox updated, every time I opened the browser and every time I opened a window it automatically opened with a screen showing the purple private browsing icon at the top and the page itself showed Privacy Tracking - On. I loved that. Today, after updating to 48.0.2 it no longer does not. I have spent the past hour searching the web. I know how to turn on private browsing (Tools > Option > Privacy > History > change the "FireFox will" field to "Use custom..." and check the, "Always use private..." box). The problem is once I close and reopen the browser the settings are lost. Once I open a new tab, the settings are lost. So, how do I get back what I had (purple Private Browsing icon and screen saying Privacy Tracking - On)? How do I keep the Private Browsing and Privacy Protection permanently on? As is when I make the change the setting is lost when I close and reopen the browser. I have tried this with and without signing on.

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Usually we don't recommend always running Firefox in private browsing mode because some websites will not function properly with this mode enabled.

You should just be able to add a line to the Firefox shortcut in order to force Firefox to open a private browsing window instead of a regular window. To do this, right click on the Firefox shortcut on your desktop and select Properties. Now add -private-window to the end of the Target field, ensuring to keep the added text outside of the quotes and also ensuring that you add a space separating the added text from the quotation. Once this is done, the shortcut should open a private window.

You can also manually open a private window once Firefox starts up. Further information on how to do that and more information about Firefox private browsing can be found in this Mozilla support article:


Out of curiosity, was there a specific reason why you would like to always browse using private mode in Firefox?