Not cleaning Edge and Chrome cookies

[Jeff M]

Neither Edge or Chrome are running , but the latest CCleaner refuses to clean cookies for either browser.

[nukecad]

That's usually because the browser or an add-on is still running in the background after closing.

CCleaner should ask you if you want to close the browser if it's still running in the background, but you may have told it not to show you the message.
Going to Options>Advanced and clicking on "Restore default settings" should cause that message to be displayed again rather the Custom Clean just 'Skipping' clearing the browser.
Of course remember that doing that will also remove any other customisation that you had put in place, so you will have to set those up again.

Ideally though most do not want a browser to keep running after you close it. so you have to go to the browsers settings and turn off that background running.

For Edge, to stop it from running in the background after closing, in the  Edge settings, go to "system and performance" and turn off both "Startup boost" and "Continue running background extensions and apps when microsoft edge is closed."

Do similar in Chrome.

[SumGuy]

I have the same issue. After running Custom Clean, I have six Cookie files "cleaned" for Chrome and six for Edge. All twelve files are 0 KB. Re-analyzing immediately afterward shows those same twelve files still exist.

 
 

It happens without the browsers running in the background. I already had both Chrome and Edge set to not continue running in the background after closing. I also ran Custom Clean while intentionally leaving the browsers open to see if I still get the pop-up warning asking "Do you want CCleaner to close Chrome/Edge?", and the "Do not show me this message again" box is still unchecked. So that's not the cause for me.

Edited March 14 by SumGuy

[Jeff M]

The message to close the browser does come up if either is running as I have not altered settings from the defaults. I even tried rebooting and running CCleaner immediately , but still the Edge and Chrome cookies entries remain.  Like the display from SunGuy above , they both show 0 KB and a few files. never had that issue in prior versions - just started with the latest one.

[Zarkos]

Também

[nukecad]

Well if they are zero bytes then they are empty -  In other words they have been cleaned.

They are probably cookie 'containers' where cookies will be put when there are some.

'Clean' doesn't mean 'Delete'. - You don't have to throw a file cabinet away to get rid of the files in there.

If you right click on one of them and select "View all files" it will show you just what the files are.

I suspect that they will be associated with extensions. (browser internal extensions, not your own user add-ons), like these from Edge on this laptop:

I don't use Edge so those should usually be empty anyway.

 

PS. Have a read of the second part of the link in my signature below this post 'Files that come back after cleaning'.

 

[Jeff M]

The above could be the case , however , the entry has always been removed with past versions.

 

[SumGuy]

@nukecad 

You're right, the entries are for extensions, but they aren't detected in previous CCleaner versions, so it's natural to be curious of their reoccurring presence after an update.

Those Cookie file sizes are 0 KB before AND after being cleaned, even after running hundreds of browser tabs. Plenty of other 0 KB files also appear in the "cleaned" list that don't reappear, so we really can't tell if anything's actually being cleaned at all - containers or not...

Another curious thing is that after cleaning with CCleaner v6.22, and then immediately running the portable CCleaner v6.21, I have 85 Chrome Internet Cache files that remain in the analysis that don't show in v6.22.

Seems off to me.

[Patrice35]

•  
• Members
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Posted yesterday at 08:33

Hi,

First, sorry for my poor english.

CCleaner cannot delete the following items in Chrome and Edge :

Cookie : extension://nkeimhogjdpnpccoofpliimaahmaaom          0 Ko

Cookie : extension://nkeimhogjdpnpccoofpliimaahmaaom          0 Ko

These two items are present before and after deleting.

The text of these items is the same for both and say the situation of CCleaner after analysis or after the last action of deleting made by CCleaner

Why?

Best regards

[lmacri]

To see all extensions in MS Edge type edge://system in the address bar and then click the Expand button next to extensions.  For example, the image below shows the extension with the ID nkeimhogjdpnpccoofpliimaahmaaome (with an "e" at the end) is the hidden (built in) WebRTC v1.3.21 extension in my MS Edge v122 browser.

If you have a Chrome browser type chrome://system in the address bar.

 

Note that Malwarebytes Browser Guard and uBlock Origin are the only two extensions I've added to my MS Edge browser.

------------
Dell Inspiron 5584 * 64-bit Win 10 Pro v22H2 build 19045.4170 * Firefox v123.0.1 * Microsoft Edge v122.0.2365.92 * Microsoft Defender v4.18.24020.7-1.1.24020.9 * Malwarebytes Premium v4.6.10.316-1.0.2286 * Macrium Reflect Free v8.0.7783 * CCleaner Free Portable v6.21.10918

[nukecad]

13 hours ago, SumGuy said:

@nukecad 

You're right, the entries are for extensions, but they aren't detected in previous CCleaner versions, so it's natural to be curious of their reoccurring presence after an update.

Those Cookie file sizes are 0 KB before AND after being cleaned, even after running hundreds of browser tabs. Plenty of other 0 KB files also appear in the "cleaned" list that don't reappear, so we really can't tell if anything's actually being cleaned at all - containers or not...

Another curious thing is that after cleaning with CCleaner v6.22, and then immediately running the portable CCleaner v6.21, I have 85 Chrome Internet Cache files that remain in the analysis that don't show in v6.22.

Seems off to me.
 

As per lmacri;s post above, they are the browsers own built in 'extensions', not the same thing as the user added extensions/add-ons.

I suspect that they are 'containers', always there and empty unless something is put into them, I don't use Edge Chromium at all but still see them for Edge.

The cleaning has been updated in 6.22, but are your cleaning settings exactly the same when using 6.21 portable?
ie. Has the installed 6.22 had the Chrome cleaning modified from the defaults (which portable would use).

[SumGuy]

10 hours ago, nukecad said:

As per lmacri;s post above, they are the browsers own built in 'extensions', not the same thing as the user added extensions/add-ons.

I suspect that they are 'containers', always there and empty unless something is put into them, I don't use Edge Chromium at all but still see them for Edge.

The cleaning has been updated in 6.22, but are your cleaning settings exactly the same when using 6.21 portable?
ie. Has the installed 6.22 had the Chrome cleaning modified from the defaults (which portable would use).

It seems the opposite is true for my extensions. The leftovers are for the ones I added myself. None of the Google/Edge built-in extensions show up at all. There's also one for my AV and a couple of Google branded extensions I added that don't show in the leftovers either.

It's the same extensions that I've installed in both Google Chrome and Edge:
PayPal Honey, uBlock Origin, YouTube Auto HD, WebRTC Control (NOT the built-in WebRTC plugins), Scroll Anywhere, and Behind The Overlay.

EDIT: One of the leftovers for Edge is "Cookie: s://devtool" (not listed as an extension), and I don't have PayPal Honey installed for Edge. The rest are the same as Google Chrome.
 

As for the leftover Internet Cache files, yes I manually matched the settings. I deleted them with CCleaner v6.21, and there haven't been any more anomalies since, so I hope it was just a one-off.

[Patrice35]

Hello

The two items have the same name but it refer to Hangouts in Chrome ans WebRTC in Edge.

 

Cookie : extension://nkeimhogjdpnpccoofpliimaahmaaom          0 Ko

Are they safety  ?

Is it possible to delete them ?

Best regards

[redwolfe_98]

1 hour ago, Patrice35 said:

Are they safety  ?

yes. ccleaner 6.22 is just erroneously listing some browser-extensions as being cookies. it is a bug in ccleaner 6.22.

[Caz1964]

Thanks Red-makes sense. I moved back to the prior version for now which appears to clean and resolve these extension as in prior. Plus, I hate the new health check with all the added 'checks and balances' verses one health cleaning click like the custom clean. :)

[lmacri]

1 hour ago, Caz1964 said:

...I moved back to the prior version for now which appears to clean and resolve these extension as in prior. Plus, I hate the new health check with all the added 'checks and balances' verses one health cleaning click like the custom clean. :)

Does anyone know if previous CCleaner versions like CCleaner v6.21 actually cleaned browser extensions, or is this something new that's been added to v6.22?

Cleaning of browser extensions doesn't sound like something that most users would need or want.  See APMichael's 27-Jul-2020 topic Problem with Firefox 79  about a bug in CCleaner v5.69.7865 (released 21-Jul-2020) that wiped custom settings in many Firefox 79 browser extensions (e.g., the user's custom list of whitelisted / trusted websites in content blockers like uBlock Origin) because Avast / Piriform did not revise their cleaning rules after Mozilla changed the way that extension settings were saved in the Firefox storage.sync file.

Since then I've stopped using CCleaner's Custom Clean feature to clean anything in my default Firefox browser, and I now use my built-in Firefox settings to clean select browsing history items like cookies and the Internet cache each time that Firefox is closed.  Note that MS Edge, which I rarely use, has a similar setting at Privacy, Search and Services | Clear Browsing Data | Choose What to Clear Every Time You Close The Browser.

I also never run CCleaner's Health Check tool on my system because I feel it's it's too aggressive and prone to problems.
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Dell Inspiron 5584 * 64-bit Win 10 Pro v22H2 build 19045.4170 * Firefox v123.0.1 * Microsoft Edge v122.0.2365.92 * Microsoft Defender v4.18.24020.7-1.1.24020.9 * Malwarebytes Premium v4.6.10.316-1.0.2286 * Macrium Reflect Free v8.0.7783 * CCleaner Free Portable v6.21.10918

[redwolfe_98]

in the past, sometimes i would hear people tell others not to use ccleaner for cleaning firefox but it has never been a problem for me.

just make sure to untick the option for removing "site preferences."

running ccleaner 6.22 did not remove my brower-extensions of any of the settings that i had for them. i don't think that there is any cleaning of browser-extensions.

i also rolled back to ccleaner 6.21.

[jagged]

I very much appreciate this thread. With the newest version of CCleaner, I have the same issues as noted above:

1. the Edge and Chrome cookies (albeit empty) that show under Cleaning Complete as noted by SumGuy.

2. the weird "extension://nkeimhog..." that shows under Options > cookies on computer.

In addition,

3. under Options > cookies on computer, there's a new www.ccleaner.com cookie that appears to delete, but returns immediately.

 

These are all different results from previous versions of CCleaner.

 

Also, thank you to Imacri for excellent directions on how to find the "extension://nkeimhog..." extension on Edge. I was worried about that thing because I'd never seen it before and wondered if my PC had keylogging malware.

Edited March 18 by jagged

[DaggerDX]

I recently began having this issue with CCleaner, Version 6.22.10977.  I don't use Google Chrome except for viewing 2 or 3 websites and when I run CCleaner, I now see a:

Google Chrome - Cookies    0 KB    1 files    
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cookie: extension://ohhcpmplhhiiaoiddkfboafbhiknefd    0 KB

I have run CCleaner several time since this began appearing and I have gone into C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\<profile> and run a Windows Explorer search for this cookie extension but no files are found and yet, after each "Clean Run", this file continues to appear.

[hazelnut]

26 minutes ago, DaggerDX said:

I recently began having this issue with CCleaner, Version 6.22.10977.  I don't use Google Chrome except for viewing 2 or 3 websites and when I run CCleaner, I now see a:

Google Chrome - Cookies    0 KB    1 files    
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Cookie: extension://ohhcpmplhhiiaoiddkfboafbhiknefd    0 KB

I have run CCleaner several time since this began appearing and I have gone into C:\Users\<username>\AppData\Local\Google\Chrome\User Data\<profile> and run a Windows Explorer search for this cookie extension but no files are found and yet, after each "Clean Run", this file continues to appear.

Read this ongoing thread.

https://community.ccleaner.com/topic/66708-not-cleaning-edge-and-chrome-cookies/

 

[Caz1964]

Yup, still no update or new version. However, I did confirm one thing after looking at the 'how to' post by Imacry to verify extensions. Indeed these are the browser extensions-at least 3 of the 4 were for me. Once I matched the ext text, they were Google's YouTube Non Stop, AD Block and looper. So, it just appears that CCleaner will show extensions but designated as empty after cleaning?? No prior builds showed these??   ODD.....

[nukecad]

I don't find it odd at all, it's just something new with Chrome/Chromium that you haven't seen before in CCleaner.

If the developers don't decide to hide them from view then you'll soon get used to seeing them.

As I said above - 'Clean' doesn't mean 'Delete' - You don't have to throw a box away to get rid of the files in it, you throw the files but keep the box to put more in later.

Browsers these days tend to put cookies in related sections (boxes) rather than just all in one place like they used to be, so many boxes rather than one big box.
Firefox was the first major browser to implement it and calls them 'Cookie Jars', each 'Jar' typically contains all the cookies from one website.
(And it took CCleaner a month or two to catch up with what Firefox had changed).
It's done for security, eg. so that a website can't easily read the cookies from different websites.
This graphic shows how instead of all cookies being in one place they are now put in seperate sections. (Jars/Boxes or whatever you want to call them).
https://blog.mozilla.org/en/mozilla/firefox-rolls-out-total-cookie-protection-by-default-to-all-users-worldwide/

I'm not exactly sure how Chrome/Chromium is now doing it, or what it calls the sections, but it will be similar.

So what we are now seeing in CCleanerv6.22  is some of those sections/boxes that belong to the Chrome/Chromium browser itself.
We see the ones that the browser won't let you delete, or puts straight back if you do delete them.

They are zero bytes because they are empty  - they've been cleaned out.

[lmacri]

On 16/03/2024 at 12:01, lmacri said:

Does anyone know if previous CCleaner versions like CCleaner v6.21 actually cleaned browser extensions, or is this something new that's been added to v6.22?

2 hours ago, nukecad said:

I don't find it odd at all, it's just something new with Chrome/Chromium that you haven't seen before in CCleaner....Browsers these days tend to put cookies in related sections (boxes) rather than just all in one place like they used to be, so many boxes rather than one big box....

Hi nukecad:

Browser extensions are not cookies. What exactly is CCleaner v6.22 cleaning when it tries to clean your browser extensions?

As I said <above>, I do not want CCleaner accidentally wiping custom settings in my browser extensions (e.g., extra filters and / or custom lists of whitelisted / trusted websites in content blockers like uBlock Origin).
------------
Dell Inspiron 5584 * 64-bit Win 10 Pro v22H2 build 19045.4170 * Firefox v124.0.0 * Microsoft Edge v122.0.2365.92 * Microsoft Defender v4.18.24020.7-1.1.24020.9 * Malwarebytes Premium v4.6.10.316-1.0.2286 * Macrium Reflect Free v8.0.7783 * CCleaner Free Portable v6.21.10918

[Caz1964]

@nukecad, thanks for the response and detail.

 My question/concern is rather simple. When you clean a file/location/drive, the normal expectation of a cleaned success is ‘0’ or nothing shown that is remaining. Based on this logic, CCleaner absolutely did this until this version. It is absolutely normal to have these questions in a world of everyone’s desire to remain secure as to know ‘what and why’ is in their system and when to remove..etc.. Remaining files after a cleaning when never the case prior,  needs to be answered by the Vendor even if a subtle system change. Its when you start to not care about these things is when you suffer attacks. I learned the hard way.

[nukecad]

@Caz1964 I do see what you are saying.

I agree that ideally Custom Clean shouldn't show these new items if they are empty, a bit more coding to check for that is required.
But I don't see an issue with them other than them showing when they are empty.
They are showing as zero bytes, so there is nothing in them to clean.

You could look at it this way:
CCleaner is showing you that these items are there, and that if they are not empty then they will be cleaned.
Although I agree that they probably shouldn't be shown in the results window if they are empty anyway.

 

On 22/03/2024 at 23:02, Caz1964 said:

 the normal expectation of a cleaned success is ‘0’ or nothing shown that is remaining. Based on this logic, CCleaner absolutely did this until this version.

Actually that's not strictly correct, except in two circumstances.
I have been using CCleaner for years and there are only two situations that I know of where you will get a totally blank results window after an 'Ananalyze' or 'Run Cleaner', and one of those is only temporary.

1. An empty results window can happen simply depending on what you have ticked/unticked for Custom Clean. (so if you are not scanning for/cleaning the items that are always shown then of course you don't see them).
2. An empty results window can happen temporararily if you repeatedly run cleans without closing CCleaner in between each. (because Windows then temporarily stops recreating them to try and work out what keeps removing them and if they are being repeatedly removed by an error).

There have always been certain items that come back straight after cleaning, plus there are a couple of items that CCleaner itself creates on opening that it then always finds to clean (unless you have that section unticked).

And for years now people have asked about why certain files always show even after they have just cleaned.

So, (six years ago now), I wrote a post about it - explaining what the files that keep re-appearing straight after a clean are, why they keep re-appearing, and how you can stop some of it. It gets asked so much that I even included a link to it in my signature below every post I make.
See the second half of this:
https://community.ccleaner.com/topic/52668-tracking-files-not-cleaned-files-coming-back-solvedexplained/?tab=comments#comment-300043
(I do update that post from time to time, and have now updated it to reflect that the Health Check UI has changed).