Beijing customs confiscated more than 190,000 items of pirated goods, worth more than 88 million yuan, last year.

An increasing number of the fake goods were electronic products such as mobile phones and MP3s, said Cai Bin, director of the law and regulation department at Beijing customs.

"In the past, most products were clothing, including hats or shoes," he said.

Most of them - more than 167,000 items worth more than 55 million yuan - were confiscated while in the process of being sent by ordinary and express mail, Cai said.

While Cai did not say how many of the items were being exported, figures released by People's Daily on Tuesday revealed that 99 percent of the pirated goods confiscated last year were bound for overseas.

The Beijing customs office showed off some of the fake goods on Tuesday, which included sports shoes, watches, mobile phones and GPS devices.

Cai said it is becoming more difficult to tell which product is fake because much of the material used is similar to that on genuine ones.

"Our personnel needs to have special training to be able to check for potential infringements," he said.

The Beijing municipal bureau of public security also reported on Thursday it investigated 2,057 cases related to copyright infringement, confiscated 140,000 pieces of various illegal publications, and arrested 2,229 people.