French authorities threatened to block Chinese online store Shein on Monday over the presence of a sex doll with "childlike" features on its website. 

The French consumer watchdog said descriptions for such products on the Shein website "make it difficult to doubt the child pornographic nature of the content."

The French daily newspaper Le Parisien said the product in question — an 80 centimeter (30 inch) tall doll holding a teddy bear — was accompanied by an explicitly sexual description on the Shein website.

How has Shein reacted to the French threat?

In a statement late on Monday, Shein announced "a total ban on sex-doll type products" and the removal of previous listings of such items.

The Paris prosecutors' office said it had opened an investigation into Shein, along with rival retailers AliExpress, Temu and Wish, over the sale of sex dolls.

On Tuesday, the e-commerce giant pledged to "cooperate fully" with the French authorities.

"We will be completely transparent with the authorities. If they ask us to do so, we will comply," Quentin Ruffat, the company spokesperson in France, told RMC radio.

"We will put the necessary safeguards in place to ensure that this does not happen again," Ruffat said, adding that what has happened is "serious, unacceptable, intolerable."

'Boundaries have been crossed'

Prior to Shein's announcement of a ban on sex dolls, French Economy Minister Robert Lescure on Monday said "boundaries have been crossed" and added that he would seek to have Shein banned from doing business in France if similar incidents occur in the future.

The French consumer watchdog also noted that Shein sells other pornographic products, including adult-sized sex dolls, without effective age-filtering measures to prevent "minors or sensitive audiences from accessing such pornographic content."

"We are taking this situation extremely seriously," Ruffat in a statement on X. "This type of content is completely unacceptable and goes against all the values we stand by."

He said "immediate" measures would be taken to rectify the situation.

France threatens to block Shein

Lescure said going as far as to block as service was a measure taken in extreme cases.

"This is provided for by law in cases involving terrorism, drug trafficking, or child pornographic materials, the government has the right to request that access to the French market be prohibited," the economy minister said.

French laws dictate that the company must remove illegal content from its website within 24 hours or else internet providers can be ordered to block access to the site as well as potentially delisting it.

Shein has previously been forced to pay fines in France for failing to comply with online cookie legislation, false advertising, misleading information and failing to declare the presence of plastic microfibers in its products. In 2025, Shein has paid out a total of €191 million ($220 million) in fines to French authorities.

The company, which has become a global leader in cheap clothing, is also days away from opening its first brick-and-mortar store in central Paris. which has sparked protest and outrage.

Edited by: Zac Crellin