More than 40 university bosses have written to the education secretary calling for so-called essay mill companies to be banned.
Some students pay for bespoke, original assignments - which cannot easily be detected by anti-plagiarism software. But the letter says these essay-writing services should be targeted rather than those who pay for their services.
Such services undermine the integrity of higher education and are unfair to honest, diligent students, they say.
Universities minister Sam Gyimah said the government was working to "bear down" on the problem - and added that "legislative options are not off the table".
The letter has been signed by 46 vice-chancellors and heads of higher education bodies, some of whom represent the UK's largest and most prestigious universities.
Students caught submitting work that is not their own face serious penalties, which can include being thrown off their university course.
However, in the UK it is not illegal to offer a commercial essay-writing service. And many advertise widely near university campuses and on social media.
A recent survey of students around the world by Swansea University found about 15% had cheated in the past four years, up from an average of 3.5% over the past 40 years. It also suggested 31 million students globally had paid someone else to undertake their work.
The vice-chancellors say making the services illegal would stop them operating out of the UK and allow them to be removed from online search engine findings.
In the letter, they call on the government to commit to introducing legislation to ban the provision and advertising of essay mills before the end of this Parliament.
They also want the government to support efforts by Quality and Assurance Agency (QAA), the higher education standards body, and the Office for Students (OFS) to tackle the issue.
Essay mill companies are already banned in New Zealand and some parts of the United States.
