hello, the first part of your profile folder is just a randomly generated string - not sure what is creepy about that, it's just a local folder on your system...

If that were the case I would agree with you. It is not, however, the case: mine creates two "defaults," one an apparently random string in the following alphanumeric format "aaaa1a1a.default-1111111111111" (this one is not created until I actually launch Firefox for the first time) and another called "Judas5w3v.default." (this one is there right from the get-go, even before Firefox is launched) Maybe it's just me but the whole "Judas" thing has me a bit concerned, as does the fact that there appears to be two "default" profiles. Sorry if my concerns seem neophyte, I am certainly no expert in matters cyber and it is thus that I turn to forums like this one for clarification and help. Any insights appreciated, thanx.

A short answer. The problem profile is brand new. Firefox is brand new. So the problem profile has no important information or data in it ? If you agree that is the case just delete it. Well in fact it is safer at least initially to rename it just add some preceding characters such as old or 666 Firefox will then stop using it.

Hazarding a guess I would say maybe one profile is prexisting, but Firefox is not able to locate it and so creates a new profile.

You may use the built in profile manager to manage profiles. However take great care. It is very easy to delete the wrong profile. Also take note that it is not normally recommended to use the profile manager to rename profiles, because it only renames the second part of the name, and it does not actually change the name of the folder used. (There are ways round this but let's not compilcate matter unnecessarily at this stage)

Which profile is actually in use and are you able to choose between these profiles when opening Firefox with the profile manager ?

• See Profile Manager - Create, remove or switch Firefox profiles
• Use keyboard shortcut Winkey+R to get a run dialogue. Type firefox.exe -P and press Enter to execute.
• Also see http://kb.mozillazine.org/Bypassing_the_Profile_Manager#Background

Of course the oddly named profile may have been created by malware, so you may wish to scan with all the tools mentioned in this article

• Troubleshoot Firefox issues caused by malware

Then again it may be perfectly innocent and down to the monkeys

"aaaa1a1a.default-1111111111111" is probably the result of doing a Refresh.

The prefix of the Profile name is an auto-generated cryptographic hash (known as 'salt') that is an 8 alpha/numeric character string.

The suffix would be close to this default-1454043906128 when a Refresh is done. The number sequence is the 'date / time' the Refresh was done, expressed in the "epoch" time format. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_time

the-edmeister said

"aaaa1a1a.default-1111111111111" is probably the result of doing a Refresh.

Thanks Ed I do not often use Refresh|Reset but I should have picked that up.

The prefix of the Profile name is an auto-generated cryptographic hash (known as 'salt') that is an 8 alpha/numeric character string.

I did do quick search prior to answering the question. I did not find the details of the current name generation. I did come across a year 2000 35 page bug; on the method initially used, while still constrained to 8.3 file names. That introduced an 8 character alpha numeric salt seeded from the timestamp.

• Bug 56002 - Make path to profile dir unpredictable

The suffix would be close to this default-1454043906128 when a Refresh is done. The number sequence is the 'date / time' the Refresh was done, expressed in the "epoch" time format. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unix_time