Lost password
I am trying to fix a situation on my parents computer that uses Firefox. We had to uninstall Firefox, reboot and reinstall the Firefox browser. After doing this I expected to be able to "Login" using her email and password, she had lost her password so I assumed there would be a "forgot password" link available to recover it. Instead this was not an option, after entering email it went straight to an option to enter a new password. There does not appear to be a point to recover a lost password, or to enter it in a new login after doing a new install. I found some tips while doing a Google search that instructed to click on the user icon in the toolbar and a reset would be there but that was not available either. Any suggestions.
All Replies (6)
Passwords are stored in the browser using two encrypted files. Open the Password Manager and you should be able to look them up.
If there is no data, it's possible a new profile was created.
If you mean a Firefox Account password:
You can login by clicking Firefox's main menu button, then Sign in to Firefox.
If the email address wasn't recognized, are you sure they had a Firefox Account set up before?
Unfortunately, the only way to reset a Firefox Account password also erases all the data stored by Sync, so you probably do not want to do that until you have exhausted other options: I've lost my Firefox Sync account information - What to do. A little light hypnotism perhaps?
I don't use Firefox so not as familiar with the product. I would assume she has an account as she has used this browser for years and has dozens if not hundreds of bookmarks stored in it. I would assume you have to have some login in place to save those.
When I try to sign in to Firefox, it gives me the box to enter an email address, which I use the only one she has, but then it does not give me a box to enter a password, nor a link for a forgotten password. It gives me the double boxes for entering a new password twice, along with an age. This is for creating a new account which is not what I want.
Main thing is trying to get her bookmarks back, not sure if she had anything backing those up or not.
Firefox Accounts are a newer thing, so it's not unusual for long-time users to have never set one up.
When you uninstalled Firefox, did you scrub off its data or might that still be on the disk? You can check the default location by using this shortcut link in the Windows 10 system search box or in the address bar of Windows File Explorer:
%APPDATA%\Mozilla\Firefox\Profiles
There's going to be at least one folder, which is the new one missing the data. Do you have any other folders? If so, double-click into them and find the bookmarkbackups folder. That should contain at least a week's worth compressed files with the creation date coded into the file name.
Anything there?
Also, when the Firefox Refresh feature runs, it creates a folder on the Windows desktop named Old Firefox Data. If you see one of those, drill down to bookmarkbackups in there.
If you are able to find a backup file, this article has the steps to restore it (you'll need to use Choose File to point Firefox to the location of the file):
Restore bookmarks from backup or move them to another computer
I'll try this and see thanks, I did notice she had a Old Firefox data folder on her computer but the most recent file date was in 2018 so not sure how up to date her bookmarks may be but its worth a try. Thanks
Randy39 said
When I try to sign in to Firefox, it gives me the box . . . .
If you are talking about sync, sync is used to share data between several systems/profiles. It is not a backup service.