This photograph shows the Shein e-commerce site on a mobile phone with the company’s website page in the background in Paris on November 5, 2025.
The French government said on Wednesday, November 5, it would suspend the Shein digital platform until the Asian e-commerce giant complied with French legislation, as controversy swirled over the online sale of childlike sex dolls. The announcement came as Shein opened its first brick-and-mortar store in the world in Paris amid a heavy police presence.
“On the instructions of the prime minister, the government is initiating the procedure to suspend Shein for the time necessary for the platform to demonstrate to the public authorities that all of its content is finally in compliance with our laws and regulations,” the office of Prime Minister Sébastien Lecornu said. “An initial review will be conducted by ministers within the next 48 hours.”
Read more Subscribers only Shein: Why French authorities struggle to regulate the fast-fashion giant
Separately, the fast-fashion retailer said that it was suspending products from third-party sellers in France.
The discovery of sex dolls on Shein’s website triggered a political outcry in France. The Paris prosecutor’s office has opened investigations against Shein, and also rival online retailers AliExpress, Temu and Wish, over the sale of the sex dolls.
Read more Subscribers only Understanding Shein’s sex doll scandal in five questions
Shein, which was founded in China in 2012 but is now based in Singapore, has pledged to cooperate with French authorities and announced it was banning all sex dolls on its platform. In a new development, prosecutors said a man, already convicted of sexual assault, was arrested after ordering a childlike sex doll from China.
Employees of a delivery company alerted police in the southern town of Bouc-Bel-Air after discovering a sex doll “in a package from China,” prosecutors in Aix-en-Provence said. The parcel did not come from Shein, prosecutor Jean-Luc Blachon told Agence France-Presse. The man, taken into custody, had previously been convicted of sexual assault and “admitted to having ordered the doll for sexual purposes,” the prosecutor’s office said.
Editorial Shein’s business practices: The regulation is falling short
Reuse this content
