Ccleaner Pro is not wiping history/cookies when I close Firefox

[Keosk]

As stated in title. When I shut the firefox browser, ccleaner shows wiping animation and notifies me that browser history has been cleaned but when I check, everything is still there.

I'm using trial version of ccleaner pro on Windows 10 Pro Version  10.0.10586 Build 10586

What is the problem?

thanks.

[nukecad]

Do you have your Firefox synced?
If so then the history, passwords, add-ons and open tabs are saved on Mozilla's cloud servers as well as on your machine.

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/products/firefox/sync

You can clear them off your machine using CCleaner, but Firefox will just put them back again (sync them) from the server.

The only way to stop that happening is to stop using sync.
You can delete the synced info yourself from within Firefox, but no 3rd party cleaner can access Mozilla's servers, for obvious security reasons.

[Keosk]

Hi.

No it isn't synced and I'm not signed in to firefox or any other cloud service.

I close firefox and see the cleaning animation then ccleaner notifies me that firefox history etc has all been cleaned. Then when I right click on the firefox icon in the task bar I see a list of clickable links to websites I recently visited under the "Frequent" section. I reopen firefox and close it down again, repeating the automatic cleaning process and again ccleaner tells me history has been deleted (quoting the same Mb size of files cleaned) but when I right click on firefox the links are still there. 

Since first posting about this, I have reinstalled windows and also reinstalled a trial version of pro and I am still witnessing this behavior. I thought it may have something to do with the CCleaner program being open when I close firefox. But not sure.

So, basically, the problem is not solved.

p.s. I should add that this happens relatively infrequently, occurring maybe 1/20 of firefox sessions.

[nukecad]

2 hours ago, Keosk said:

 when I right click on the firefox icon in the task bar I see a list of clickable links to websites I recently visited under the "Frequent" section.

Ah, I see the misunderstanding.

That's the taskbar jumplist, which is saved by Windows itself and not by Firefox.

You need to tick 'Taskbar Jump List' in the Windows Explorer section of CCleaner to clear that right click listing.

Or simply turn off Taskbar Jump lists in Windows itself.
Settings>Personalisation>Start>Show recently opened items in Jump lists in Start or the taskbar.
Turning that switch to 'off' will mean that no recent files/locations are saved by Windows jumplist, so they won't be listed when you right click a taskbar icon.
(That will mean that none of the icons on your taskbar will have a 'recent' list when you right click it).

[Keosk]

Got it! Thanks for clearing that up.

Edit: The only issue I have with your explanation is this: When I clear history from inside the browser, this action also clears the jump list on the task bar. This is firefox cleaning up after itself, not Windows. So why can't this action be incorporated in CCleaner's automatic cleaning when I close firefox? Sorry, it just seems that it's a reasonable expectation that Pro would do this.

Edited May 6, 2019 by Keosk

[Keosk]

Consider my edit above as a new post.

[nukecad]

On 02/05/2019 at 18:51, Keosk said:

So why can't this action be incorporated in CCleaner's automatic cleaning when I close firefox?

You'd need one of the developers to answer that, and although we're told they do read these posts they don't often comment.

I'd suspect that it's probably because it wouldn't be easy to clear just the Firefox jump list on it's own without clearing all the other jump lists.

(TBH I'm not sure exactly how the jump lists are stored by Windows, but I know from writing my own Firefox cleaning routine that it's always easier to delete a file thus clearing everything than it is to edit the file to remove selected parts).

[Keosk]

The problem appears to be more extensive than just jumplists. Having performed a ccleaner custom clean with all conceivable wipe options selected I reopened firefox and navigated to youtube expecting to start a new log in and guess what, I find myself still logged in to my account!

Tried this a dozen times in a row. Closed Firefox, let cceaner autoclean, then opened ccleaner to do a manual clean, reopened firefox and navigated to you youtube and.......... I'm still logged in to gmail and youtube. Interestingly, for a brief moment on loading the youtube's homepage it doesn't appear that I'm logged in but suddenly the page does a reloads and logs me right back in.

Currently the only reliable way to clean my browser history and logins is by doing it manual clean through the firefox browser itself. I have no idea what on earth is going on here but as things stand CCleaner is redundant and not fit for purpose.

Any CCleaner programmers wish to comment?

[Keosk]

Here is a capture of the said behaviour:

 

Project 1.mp4

[nukecad]

15 hours ago, Keosk said:

 Interestingly, for a brief moment on loading the youtube's homepage it doesn't appear that I'm logged in but suddenly the page does a reloads and logs me right back in.

Currently the only reliable way to clean my browser history and logins is by doing it manual clean through the firefox browser itself.

That's different from the taskbar jumplists, there is no way they would log you into anything they are just a list of where you have been.

TBH that does sound like something (Firefox or youtube) is syncing your login.

You machine is cleared and you aren't logged in from your machine itself, but then suddenly something syncs and logs you in.

If clearing through Firefox itself clears the problem then that to me would suggest that it's Firefox that is syncing.
Alternatively youtube may be saving a cookie on it's own servers that recognises you machine and logs you in when you visit.

Youtube is owned by google and they have a habit of syncing their programmes without asking you.
eg. Logging into Gmail automatically logs you into youtube and Chrome if you have them. All 3 seem to be synced like this.

This article talks about Gmail and Chrome, but also mentions that youtube is involved.
https://searchengineland.com/when-users-log-into-gmail-or-youtube-theyre-now-also-logged-in-to-chrome-305801

Again that login behaviour seems to point to something syncing (without you telling it to?).

Obviously CCleaner can only clean your machine, it can't touch somebody else's servers.