ALBANY - A leading cigarette dealer licensed by the state has agreed to stop selling cigarettes without tax stamps to Internet retailers who sell them illegally nationwide.

State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer said Harold Levinson Associates, based in Farmingdale on Long Island, agreed to stop selling cigarette packs without tax stamps other than to the few legitimate outlets.

Those legal outlets include Indian tribes, armed services and the United Nations.

A carton of cigarettes can sell for $65 in a store, but for less than $30 if the taxes are avoided on the black market, Spitzer said. The state has a $1.50 tax on a pack of cigarettes and New York City has an additional $1.50 for packs sold in the city.

A spokesman for the company that has sold more than 80 million packs of unstamped cigarettes a year didn't immediately respond to a request for comment Monday.

Harold Levinson, which bills itself as the largest convenience store distributor in the Northeast, is licensed by the state as a tax stamping agent.

It buys tax stamps from the state to put on cigarettes purchased from manufacturers.

The company admitted no guilt and paid no settlement or penalty.

Spitzer said he hopes to use this agreement as a model for other licensed tax stamping agents.

“In order to survive, Internet cigarette traffickers need a supply of unstamped cigarettes, a mechanism for obtaining online payments, and the means to quickly deliver their products,” Spitzer said.

In other settlements this year, Spitzer reached agreement with major credit card companies to stop processing payments for cigarettes and with major package delivery companies to stop delivering cigarettes.