They have also asked colleges in Haidian to inform foreign students of the campaign.

"In the meantime, we‘ll invest more police officers to do more checks in hotels, at embassies and at customs checkpoints," he added.

News about the campaign received a mixed response among Sina Weibo micro-bloggers on Tuesday. Some Chinese and foreign users hailed it as a positive step, while others raised concerns that it may cause animosity among law-abiding expatriates.

Officials in Chengdu, capital of Sichuan province, have confirmed that a similar campaign will be rolled out there soon.

A spokesman for the public security bureau in Guangzhou, capital of Guangdong province, declined to comment on whether the city will follow suit, while his counterparts in Shanghai were unavailable for comment as of Tuesday night.

Beijing, second only to Shanghai in terms of the number of foreigners with residency permits, was home to almost 120,000 foreigners at the end of 2011.

The capital has reported 13,000 cases of illegal entry, overstaying and illegal employment concerning foreigners from more than one hundred countries since 2008, according to exit-entry statistics.

Although 80 percent of foreigners identified as illegally residing in China do not initially intend to do so, according to recent statistics from the Ministry of Public Security, "the issue still needs attention," he said.

"Some foreigners, whose visas expired, couldn‘t afford tickets back to their countries and were afraid to find normal jobs in China. Instead, they committed crimes," he said.

A hotline will allow residents to give tip-offs to the police, he added.

Chengdu, the largest sub-provincial metropolis and provincial capital of Sichuan, said it will launch a similar plan by the end of this year, Wang Lin, deputy director of Chengdu exit and entry administration bureau, confirmed.

Yang Huanning, vice-minister of public security, told lawmakers at the legislature‘s bimonthly session that foreigners who work without an authorized permit in China are mostly language teachers, performers, and domestic helpers, while most illegal entrants come from neighboring countries.

The number of foreigners who stayed for at least six months rose to 600,000 in 2011 from fewer than 20,000 in 1980, he said.

But due to a lack of repatriation centers and language barriers it has been difficult to crack down, he said.

Yang Lin, an attorney at Ying Ke Law Firm who specializes in cases involving foreigners, suggested police distribute brochures highlighting relevant Chinese regulations for foreigners in different languages at the airport.

"After all, many foreigners have no knowledge about local laws and regulations and police should tackle the problem at source," she added.

Contact the writers at caoyin@chinadaily.com.cn and zhaoyinan@chinadaily.com.cn

Zheng Caixiong in Guangzhou contributed to this story.