Objective. In the following analysis, we investigate the determinants of government efforts to censor media. We develop and test a new theory that argues executive‐level corruption influences when governments are more likely to attempt media censorship. After modeling the media–government dynamic in game form, we utilize the new Varieties of Democracy (V‐Dem) dataset to empirically test this relationship on both traditional media (print and broadcast) and new media (Internet). Using panel, ordinary least squares (OLS) regression with a lagged dependent variable and country fixed effects, we examine the relationship from 1960 to 2015 for traditional media and from 1993 to 2015 for new media. The results suggest that as governments become more corrupt, governmental efforts to censor both forms of media are likely to increase. We further examine the relationship among different world regions and regime types; we find overall confirmation of our hypothesis.