Chinese police dealt with 1,233 pyramid selling schemes and 974 illegal fundraising cases in the first three quarters of 2010, the Ministry of Public Security announced Monday.

The police arrested 3,031 people in connection with pyramid schemes and another 1,316 in connection with illegal fundraising, a statement from the ministry said.

Police had cracked down on economic crimes like pyramid and other illegal sales schemes, which involved large numbers of stakeholders and had become a major cause of social instability.

In a 100-day campaign last year, the police broke up more than 3,000 gangs involved in pyramid schemes and destroyed more than 20,000 pyramid sales bases.

In March this year, the ministry set up a special agency to better police such economic crimes.

Since 2008, police had broken up 4,900 pyramid sales schemes and more than 4,500 cases of illegal fundraising, the statement said.