Over the years, the power of the police has gradually been expanded to border control, under the auspices of the China Immigration Inspection (CII), household registration, issuance of the National ID card (see: Resident Identity Card) and cybersecurity (under the 11th Bureau of the MPS), network security and website registration.

These factors have led some people, especially those in Hong Kong, Taiwan, and overseas Chinese communities, to inaccurately refer to mainland China's police officers as Public Security[5].

[6] The influence of the Soviet Union was paramount in the early years of the People's Republic, and guided the Chinese approach to policing.

During the Cultural Revolution (1966–76), the powers of the police were both strengthened and weakened; on the one hand, they were given control over much of the judicial system, since People's Courts and People's Procuratorates basically collapsed, meaning that local directors of public security bureaus could easily arrest and convict almost any person they chose; on the other hand, the top leadership of the police was almost totally purged and persecuted, and political commissars from the PLA (most of them hand-picked by the Cultural Revolution Group) were brought in to take control over the largest and most important public security bureaus, including those of Beijing and Shanghai.

They generally perform secret police duties and help maintain social stability and preserve the power of the ruling Chinese Communist Party.

They should not be confused with the 1st Bureau of the MPS (described above in the Public Security Police section), despite sometimes similar duties and overlapping missions.