BEIJING, April 25 (Xinhua) -- China has been stepping up its fight against intellectual property right (IPR) infringement, according to the country's top procuratorate at a press conference Thursday.

Procuratorates across China approved the arrest of 5,627 suspects involved in 3,306 IPR infringement cases in 2018, a year-on-year increase of 31.7 percent, according to the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP).

A total of 8,325 suspects involved in 4,458 such cases were prosecuted last year, 22.3 percent more than in 2017.

"IPR infringement severely harms society," Liu Taizong, a prosecutor with the SPP, said at the press conference, adding that acts such as counterfeiting, pirating and information stealing have a huge negative impact on the market and impede the country's innovation.

In 2018, procuratorates approved the arrest of 5,266 people suspected of trademark infringement in 3,100 cases and charged 7,741 people involved in 4,136 such cases.

A total of 304 people were charged for copyright infringement last year, while 56 people were prosecuted for infringing trade secrets.

"China needs to strengthen IPR protection and crackdown on IPR infringement to serve high-quality economic development, stimulate innovation and further promote the reform and opening-up and its integration into economic globalization," said Zheng Xinjian, a prosecutor with the SPP.

Investigation and handling of IPR infringement cases have been increasingly difficult because production, logistics and sales are separated and victims are hard to identify, Zheng said.

"Criminals keep updating their means by deceiving dealers and consumers with fake permits, packages, batch numbers or customs certificates."

Zheng pointed out that trademark infringement cases account for over 90 percent of IPR infringement cases, covering industries such as tobacco, alcohol, food, garments, cosmetics and digital products.