Web Credit Transactions - Some Pointers???

["Scott K. Johnson" <sjohnson@bitstream.net>]

Hello all,

I need some advice on a project I've just started...

What are good/safe methods to conduct credit card transactions over the
internet?  Obviously a secure web server, but what else do I need to be
thinking about??  I would think that you would not want to store the card
numbers on the server long...what methods may be used to take care of them
and get them to a safe location as soon as possible?  Where is a good place
to start looking for information??  I will probably want to run apache for
the server software - any better suggestions or items I need to consider?

I will also need to provide user authentication on certain web pages...where
can I get more information around that?

Any advice from those who have tackled such things before would be greatly
appreciated!!!

Thank you very much in advance!!!

Scott K. Johnson
sjohnson@bitstream.net