WWW- West Island porn producer Linda Aylesworth could face five to 10 years in a U.S. prison unless she breaks the vows she made to the countless sex performers she has dealt with over the last eight years.

“I make a personal promise that their identities are going into a filing cabinet and won’t go to anybody without a court order,” she says. “I refuse to provide it to anybody.”

But new enforcement regulations to American anti-child-porn law 18 U.S.C. 2257, signed last June by U.S. Attorney-General Alberto Gonzales, will force all porn producers doing business in the States to provide the names and addresses of all performers dating back to 1995. Records must be available to the Department of Justice for 20 hours a day. The information must not only be available to the U.S. government, but also to affiliates (Web sites paid to promote other porn sites).

Critics worry that anybody could become an affiliate simply to get the addresses and names of performers. “I think it’s very dangerous,” says Aylesworth, who runs Naughty Niche, the parent company of www.montrealdream.com and other adult sites. “A model is going to turn up dead. This law violates the privacy of the performers.”

She plans to risk potential extradition rather than comply. “I’m a chick, so I’m a little more sensitive to the [privacy] issue,” she says. “It’s just basic common sense and ethics. You don’t put profits over lives. I personally have no intention of complying.”

Greg Jones, communications rep for Old Montreal-based 2much.net, also worries that 2257 could easily put names and addresses of sex stars in the wrong hands. “You could be a stalker obsessed with Ms. X,” he says. “You want her, so you register a domain name for 10 bucks and set up a Web page and start claiming to sell content, so you could get to Ms. X. We’ll see if the Department of Justice takes the onus for somebody getting murdered by some psycho who gets ID this way.”

Those who do business in the States without complying could face criminal charges, although it’s unclear whether Canada would extradite a citizen to face them.

And not doing business with the States is out of the question. “I’d say 90 per cent of the market for Montreal companies is American,” says Jones. “So we have to submit to their rules.” (Under the new law, Canadian performers will be required to produce a green card in order to appear in American-shot porn scenes.)

Other adult industry professionals seem less apprehensive about sharing performers’ personal data. A man who would not identify himself at Montreal-based affiliate site www.braincash.com says they will comply with 2257.

Canadian Internet discussion forums are abuzz with concerns that those who comply with 2257 will be violating Canada’s privacy laws. Representatives from the Office of the Privacy Commissioner and the Ministry of Justice said they were unable to comment on the question because there seemed to be no official position on it, but Chicago-based attorney J.D. Obenberger, a leading expert on 2257, says Canadians could legally comply.

“The right to privacy is routinely waived in signed release waivers,” says Obenberger, who will speak at the Qwebec Expo porn conference here on September 3. “It could be accomplished under Canadian law.”

He notes that 2257 is the latest evolution in the original 1988 law inspired by Traci Lords, who used fake ID to become an underage porn star in the ’80s. Ironically, the new restrictions wouldn’t stop somebody who uses phony ID from performing pornography. “Congress was agitated by [the Lords case], and if your only tool is a hammer, all problems are nails,” he says.

Obenberger calls 2257 “draconian,” and is awaiting an upcoming legal challenge in Denver, Colorado, on the constitutionality of the requirement to provide identification to secondary producers like affiliate or free porn Web sites. “I’m confident they will fall,” he says.

He’s also doubtful that Canadians could be extradited. “I’ve looked at the extradition treaty and there’s no extradition for obscenity.”

The law also requires a porn entertainer with a live streaming Web site keep all her performances stored. But Obenberger says that, if a performer is broadcasting four or five hours a day, six to seven days a week for seven years, she would need 24,000 PCs to store them all. “Plus she could never take a vacation because the records must be available for inspection at least 20 hours a day. We think this creates such an enormous economic burden to put a price on freedom of expression that it isn’t consistent with American values.”