1789379 - Broken redirect left from old extension blocks sites

Status: RESOLVED INCOMPLETE

(WebExtensions :: Untriaged, defect)

Description

[[e-mail]]

User Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10.15; rv:105.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/105.0

Steps to reproduce:

I have a firefox setup for years, upgraded with extensions.

I used to have an extension (can't remember the name) that redirected according to rules, eg.
nature.com/foo --> nature-com.libproxy.myuniversity/foo

The redirect still continues, even with no relevant extension

Actual results:

I have deleted potential extensions that might cause this.
I have moved from firefox standard -> developer edition (on MacOS) and it continues.
Its in my settings somewhere but 'grep libproxy' finds nothing.

I need to search all potential extension or cache storage to find the broken data and delete it.

Comment 1

[Alex Cornestean]

Hello,

I’m from Webextensions QA and I’m attempting to reproduce the issue you are having in order to confirm it.

For the moment, I’ve tried using a redirect add-on and after setting up a redirection rule, I’ve both disabled and afterwards deleted the add-on in order to see if the redirection rule still persists. On my end, it has not i.e. after disabling/deleting the add-on the redirection was no longer in effect.
I’ve so far used Redirector: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/redirector/.

Could you list all the extensions you have installed so I can check them out in case any of them play a role in creating this issue?

Also, does the issue occur in Troubleshoot mode? https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/diagnose-firefox-issues-using-troubleshoot-mode. Troubleshoot mode will disable all extensions and themes and as such we can assess if the issue is indeed caused by an add-on or not.

Thank you !

Comment 2

[[e-mail]]

The only related extension I have is "Redirector". I have disabled and removed it with no result.

I moved from Firefox (104, regularly updated) to Firefox Developer Edition and the problem disappeared for a day or so. So it was somewhere in the configuration that got copied over.
SImilarly an upgrade of FDE got the same result: a day or twos work. Maybe it was sync'd from my Firefox account ?

Comment 3

[[e-mail]]

The problem goes away in Troubleshooter mode.

Comment 4

[Alex Cornestean]

Hello alastair,

I tried your suggestion of using a Firefox account, in case the issue was stemming from there. As it turns out, at least on my end, it does not.

I used 2 desktops, D1 and D2 both using Firefox Nightly and did the following:

1. On D1 I installed Redirector and created a redirecting rule: https://www.reddit.com/ gets redirected to https://www.facebook.com/. I then logged in using a Firefox account I created.
2. On D2, I logged into the mentioned Firefox account and it started syncing shortly after that. As a result, Redirector got installed. However, on a closer inspection of the redirection rules of the extension on D2 I saw that the rules did not get synced from D1 i.e. I created a redirection rule on D1 named “test” and it did not pass over to the add-on from D2 after the sync. As such, on D2 there were no redirection rules active.

So the redirection rule which is active should not come from the other devices you have synced.

The odd thing is that in Comment 2, you mentioned that you disabled and removed the extension, but you kept observing the issue, while in Comment 3 you mentioned that the issue goes away in Troubleshooter mode. Starting the browser in Troubleshooter mode or simply disabling your add-ons should be equivalent as the end result is that the add-ons get disabled in both cases.

Would you mind checking if the issue occurs while syncing is disabled or when you are not logged into your Firefox account, while having the extension disabled? Thank you !

Comment 5

[BugBot [:suhaib / :marco/ :calixte]]

The Bugbug bot thinks this bug should belong to the 'WebExtensions::Untriaged' component, and is moving the bug to that component. Please correct in case you think the bot is wrong.

Comment 6

[Tomislav Jovanovic :zombie]

Can't reproduce, feel free to reopen if you have a STR.