The Federal Trade Commission launched a crackdown on junk E-mail Tuesday, promising to go after people who send deceptive spam and to prosecute those who engage in illegal scams via E-mail.

The FTC says it has settled charges against seven spammers who participated in a pyramid scheme, sending out unsolicited E-mail promising riches to anyone who sent in $5. Each of the defendants has agreed to drop out of the schemes, return any future money they receive, and submit to FTC oversight. The spammers were identified through the agency's unsolicited commercial E-mail database, which contains more than 8 million spam messages sent since 1998. Consumers forward more than 15,000 junk E-mail messages a day to the FTC database at uce@ftc.gov.

In an effort to find and stop spammers, the FTC says it will mail warning letters to more than 2,000 individuals still propagating scams and will prosecute if necessary. The agency also says it will launch an educational effort in concert with various Internet service providers, the Washington Association of ISPs, and the Texas ISP Association, wherein they will produce brochures and Web pages to warn consumers about the illegal schemes.

The effort is a step in the right direction, says Jason Catlett, president and founder of anti-spam group Junkbusters, but the FTC could do more to stop the many other kinds of spammers. "They should support legislation that requires E-mail marketers to get permission before sending solicitations, or they could go after fake return addresses and nonworking opt-out instructions," he says. "But I think that's probably in the works." Catlett says the FTC crackdown should prompt companies to look at their own marketing practices and adopt E-mail best-practices rules to avoid producing spam.