BEIJING: The People's Bank of China (PBOC) and the Ministry of Public Security (MPS) have planned a nationwide crackdown on bank card crimes in 2010, the central bank said Wednesday.

The crackdown would last for 10 months, starting from January 2010, the central bank said on its website.

In the first eight months of 2009, public security departments placed on file 6,362 bank card fraud cases, doubling that of the same period last year, involving 440 million yuan (64.4 million US dollars), an annual rise of 138 percent, the PBOC said.

The official also said the Internet had become a "hotbed" for credit card crimes.

With bank card crimes on a sharp rise, the central bank and the ministry established a special organization to investigate into and tackle bank card crimes in June.

The organization would step up efforts to start a mechanism on enhancing bank card risk management, set up an information-sharing forum of bank card cases, and raise card users' awareness on protecting their card information, an official with the PBOC said.

Two billion bank cards had been issued in China by the end of this June, according to the central bank.