In November 2001 for one of the then largest FTC settlements involving online credit card fraud, Crescent agreed to pay $30 million in refunds and to post a $2-million bond before it could continue to operate its websites. As a further condition for the settlement Crescent principals Bruce A. Chew and David Bernstein were barred by the FTC from operating adult entertainment websites unless first posting bonds of $500,000 each. In December 2001 Crescent Publishing Group, Inc. changed its name to Blue Horizon Media, Inc. Following the FTC settlement, in 2003 then Crescent/Blue Horizon president Bruce Chew was indicted, along with alleged organized-crime figure Richard Martino and others on federal charges of conspiracy to commit wire fraud, credit-card fraud and money laundering for illegally billing web users including for the Playgirl website. Pursuant to a plea deal Chew would later agree to testify for the government and against various of his co-defendants. In August 2008, the magazine announced that it would cease publication of its print edition as of the January 2009 issue. After that point, the magazine planned to continue with an online-only edition.
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