BEIJING — A special operation against online copyright infringement, which started in July last year, has achieved success, said the National Copyright Administration (NCA) on Feb 27.

The authorities investigated 544 cases of online copyright violations, 74 of which were criminal ones and involved about 150 million yuan ($22.42 million) of illegal funds, said an NCA statement.

A total of 1.85 million links to pirated information were deleted and 1.23 million pirated publications were confiscated, the statement said.

The authorities paid close attention to live streaming platforms. The NCA interviewed executives of 15 platforms and pushed them to tighten internal inspection.

The platforms shut down or downgraded 140,000 accounts for copyright violation and removed 570,000 pirated short videos, the statement said.