Hey, there was a previous problem that sounds very similar to yours, so I'll link the form question and paste the solution:

[https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/que.../1271481]

Pasted Solution:

Firefox will create a large cache if your hard drive or SSD has a lot of space. To constrain it:

(1) In a new tab, type or paste about:config in the address bar and press Enter/Return. Click the button accepting the risk.

(2) In the search box above the list, type or paste cache.d and pause while the list is filtered

(3) Double-click the browser.cache.disk.smart_size.enabled preference to switch the value from true to false -- this is necessary to override the size, otherwise Firefox will enlarge it again in a day or two

(4) Double-click the browser.cache.disk.capacity preference to display a dialog where you can edit the size, then click OK -- if this number is 7 digits, for example, 1000000, that is 1 gigabyte; if this number is 6 digits, for example, 500000, that is 500 megabytes.

Hope this helps!

Hi, thank you for this insight. I followed these directions, and changed the browser.cache.disk.capacity to 500000 after changing all four of the following to FALSE browser.cache.disk.smart_size.enabled browser.cache.disk.smart_size.first_run browser.chace.disk.enable browser.cache.disk_cache_ssl

Then closed the window.

Went back to Firefox about:preferences#privacy and refreshed

Have 51,539607552 GB - all of it google.com so then I select it to remove, and then it comes back as 68719476736 GB With both youtube and google creating that (youtube is not open at this point).

any other ideas please?

Thanks Sally

Hi Sally, Please note that hidden settings edited using the about:config tool are explicitly not supported, which means that Mozilla makes no guarantees they will be supported in the future, or that Mozilla will fix them if they break. Mozilla does not test these preferences, and will not in the future. That includes security and performance testing which these preferences may affect.

When you say "hundreds of thousands of GB cached", would you be able to provide a screenshot of what you're referring to? GB usually means GigaByte, and most computers have disk space between 256 to 1000 GigaBytes, so when you say "hundreds of thousands of GB cached", that doesn't seem likely.

Hi Chris, Thanks for your message. I don't really understand what you have written about regarding security and performance. Do I need to action something?

Do you think I should go back and change all of those caches back to TRUE? Have I created an issue by changing these? Could you explain if I've created an issue, is that what you are meaning by this first sentence?

Re amount of data cached:

I noted how many GB were in the cache in the message before your reply. ie 51,539,607,552 GB - all of it google.com so then I select it to remove, and then it comes back as 68,719,476,736 GB (this was also Youtube)

I just checked it again and it has gone up (after clearing it repeatedly)

From Google.com there is currently 51,539,607,552 GB

I managed to update my signature using a different browser, so this issue is no longer stopping me from what I was trying to do.

It would be nice to clear it as it seems like an error to have so much in cache - but if it's not interfering with my online life, then perhaps I just leave it be?

Appreciate your time and consideration Sally

Hi Sally "Do you think I should go back and change all of those caches back to TRUE?" Yes, you should revert any changes you made using about:config.

Would you mind sending us a screenshot of what you're seeing? For instructions, see How do I create a screenshot of my problem?.

Have you tried CCleaner to help remove the wasted space yet.

CCleaner can cause more problems than help if you let CCleaner touch anything Firefox related.