The out-of-hours behaviour of Anna Ciriani, who calls herself "Madameweb" in hard-core videos on the Internet and at erotic shows, was "not compatible with educational activity", the head of the Friuli-Venezia Giulia education authority said.

Ciriani, dubbed the "porno-prof" by Italy's main newspapers, said she never let her hobby get in the way of her teaching.

"My behaviour at school has always been professional and irreproachable," she was quoted as saying by the AGI agency.

"I am a normal woman, with my family and my work as a teacher. I am (also) looking for transgression and sex."

Five years ago Ciriani was transferred from her post as teacher of Italian literature in a secondary school in the north-eastern town of Pordenone after students covered the toilets with nude photos of her downloaded from the Internet.

Since then she has been giving evening classes to foreign adult students in a nearby town.

Madameweb's popularity surged after a video of her shot at the Venus erotica festival in Berlin last month attracted a wide Internet following, prompting the authorities to suspend her from teaching altogether.