Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

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Fife Club
Posts: 177
Joined: March 4th, 2004, 8:20 am

Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Fife Club »

Last night I upgraded from Windows Vista Home x64 to Windows 7 Home x64. Now Firefox had a yellow and blue shield on the normal desktop icon, and every time I try to launch Firefox the screen dims and a popup launches warning me that this program does not have permission to run. The popup title is User Account Control and says "Do you want to allow the following program to make changes to this computer?" I then have to grant Firefox permission to run before it will launch. As you'd suspect, IE does not have such a restriction but I also have Google Chrome installed and surprisingly that does not carry the same permission requirement/warning, so WTF? Does everybody who upgraded to Windows 7 have this same annoying issue, because I didn't find it anywhere else on these forums? What's doing on and why does this only affect Firefox (and my antivirus program)?

Thanks
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Daifne
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Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Daifne »

No problem here, but I have also set the UAC to lower levels. Being able to do this is one of the improvements in Win 7.
Guest
Guest

Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Guest »

right-click desktop Firefox icon
click Properties
click [Advanced]
[√]Run as administrator
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Fife Club
Posts: 177
Joined: March 4th, 2004, 8:20 am

Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Fife Club »

Thanks. Setting it to run as Admin though the advanced properties seems to have done the trick. The shield is still there but that's not important compared to not having to grant permission to run 20 times a day. :-)
Guest
Guest

Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Guest »

Now you have Firefox running as you want, Turn off UAC. Restart your computer and the yellow and blue shield will be gone. Reactivate UAC and restart again. Your icon should now be fixed :)
Marshall-Savage
Posts: 1
Joined: January 4th, 2010, 7:11 pm

Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Marshall-Savage »

I have a similar problem. I have read this thread & the 2 requests in Firefox support & none of which help. Both of my computers are now running Win 7 x64 with all official updates & Firefox v3.5.6. On neither computer is Firefox set to run as Administer nor in Win XP compatibility mode. On my main computer I have not had any problems of the type "Is it alright to allow Firefox to make changes in your computer?". However, on it I turned UAC off over a month ago & I may have forgotten. On my laptop I had to turn UAC off to get the message to not appear any more. I also had another more serious problem with Firefox on the laptop, of it often not fully coming up when clicked on to start it. When this happened it would never appear on the screen & looking in the Task Manager I find Firefox using 50% of the CPU (2 cores). Canceling Firefox & re-clicking on the icon may now bring it up OK, or may not. If not, then it is back to the Task Mngr etc. till it comes up OK. Turning UAC off on the laptop also solved this problem with Firefox not coming up or sometimes coming up very slowly. I may have had some problems on my main computer with Firefox coming up but that was 2 months ago & probably with v3.5.5. One difference between the computers is that the laptop has some sort of "Group Control" turned on that I haven't been able to turn off yet, that causes me to have to enter in a comment about why I am shutting it down. I think that Firefox has some error in it's UAC to operating system interface. Thanks in advance.
NilsMedell
Guest

Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by NilsMedell »

Good tips, but not good enough for me.

I'm still being asked every time I start FF, weither or not I choose to run as admin.

Started with 3.5.6, upgraded to 3.5.7 hoping it would solve the problem, NOT! This first happened after some patches from MS, I think.

Anyone who know why this happen? Something (fishy) in W7 must have started to believe FF tries to do something it should not.

Annoying.
Newms
Guest

Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Newms »

I'm the same as Nils. I've tried having it check as admin, not check, and restarting it with both checked. I need help!
Kent-O
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Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Kent-O »

WTF I never had this problem until update to 3.6 and all of sudden the UAC message???? It says it wants access to the hard drive!! Is this a bug or possible malware? I use Secunia and religiously keep all programs up to date. I am running WIN7 64bit Ult. I am not comfortable running FireFox with elevated authority. If I cant find an answer that absolves Firefox I will not use it anymore. I am going to remove all 4 plugins I use one at a time. If I find it I will reply.
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Bluefang
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Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Bluefang »

http://support.mozilla.com/tiki-view_fo ... &forumId=1

Make sure it's not being run as admin (in shortcut and application executable properties).
There have always been ghosts in the machine... random segments of code that have grouped together to form unexpected protocols. Unanticipated, these free radicals engender questions of free will, creativity, and even the nature of what we might call the soul...
Kent-O
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Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Kent-O »

OK i figured out the problem for me anyways. I went into the file location folder the clicked on properties. Under security I had to remove system from the top level. This removed all users. Then I added back my admin with full control. My non admin account with less than full control and system with less than full control. So far so good.
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Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Guest »

Anonymous wrote:OK i figured out the problem for me anyways. I went into the file location folder the clicked on properties. Under security I had to remove system from the top level. This removed all users. Then I added back my admin with full control. My non admin account with less than full control and system with less than full control. So far so good.
Oh how I wish this would have worked for me. I too upgraded Firefox and this started. I have tried it all up to not using UAC. But I use Microsoft Security Essentials and it suggests using that. It is not a big deal but I don't like being beat by software.
Guest
Guest

Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by Guest »

Okay, so where does that leave us folk who don't understand squat? Is FF and T'bird going to be beyond us kind? Will we have to put up with this BS?
I did all the administrator on/off switches and the thing still pops up. Is the only answer to go back to whatever I had pre-FF and T'Bird?
bens4lsu
Guest

Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by bens4lsu »

I had this problem too, and found that my shortcut did NOT have the "Run as administrator" box checked.

Digging a little deeper, there's also a similar setting on the EXE itself (at least on Windows 7). I fixed by following these steps:

1. Browse to the program's EXE in the file structure. For me, it was on C:\Program Files (x86)\Mozilla Firefox\firefox.exe

2. Right click on the file, and select Properties.

3. Go to Compatibility tab, and click the button for "Change settings for all users."

4. Uncheck the "Run as administrator" box on this screen.

Hope that works for some of you who are having problems.
VanillaMozilla
Posts: 13808
Joined: November 7th, 2005, 11:26 am

Re: Firefox requires permission to run since upgrading to Window

Post by VanillaMozilla »

bens4lsu wrote:I had this problem too, and found that my shortcut did NOT have the "Run as administrator" box checked.
...4. Uncheck the "Run as administrator" box on this screen.

No, No, No! Two contradictory statements. The first one is misleading; the second one is correct. Just to clarify, make sure you DO NOT run as administrator. NOT running as administrator is an essential security feature in any computer.

If you do run as administrator, then any criminal Web site that manages to break the browser's safety features may be able to gain complete access to your computer.
Last edited by VanillaMozilla on April 7th, 2010, 6:36 am, edited 6 times in total.
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