A senior Chinese internet regulator has been expelled from the ruling Communist Party on graft charges, China’s top anti-graft body said on Friday, as it works to crack down on corruption in media and the internet.

Gao Jianyun, an official of the International Communication Office of the party’s Central Committee, which is charged with regulating the Internet, including censorship, was placed under investigation in April, state media reported.

Gao used his position to seek benefits for others and solicit “huge bribes,” the anti-graft body said, as well as to support a mistress and a child.

Party investigators have handed the case over to judicial authorities, it added.

President Xi Jinping is presiding over the worst crackdown on the Internet and online censorship in China in recent memory.

Xi has vowed to take down high-flying “tigers” as well as lowly “flies” in an anti-graft campaign that has felled Zhou Yongkang, once a powerful domestic security tsar, as well as Jiang Jiemin, the former top regulator of state-owned firms.

Xi also heads an internet security body whose remit includes building China into a cyber power, state media say. 
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