Disclosed is an image forming apparatus that connects to a device. The image forming apparatus includes a storage unit that stores, for each types of page description languages for describing printing data, permission information indicating whether execution of a control command described in the corresponding page description language is allowed; a receiving unit that receives the control command transmitted from the device; a determination unit that determines whether the execution of the control command is allowed for the image forming apparatus, based on the permission information being stored in the storage unit; and a controller that controls the image forming apparatus. When the execution of the image forming apparatus is disallowed for the image forming apparatus, the controller prevents the image forming apparatus from executing the control command.