Patent ID: 8169642

Claim:
An image forming system including a first image forming apparatus and a second image forming apparatus that are connected to each other via a network, the first image forming apparatus, comprising: a transmitter unit transferring reproduced image data as a of original image data to the second image forming apparatus via the network; a memory unit storing the original image data; and a data eraser unit erasing the original image data in the memory unit and transmitting an instruction to erase the corresponding reproduced image data to the second image forming apparatus when a user inputs an instruction to erase the original image data, wherein the data eraser unit determines whether the original image data is subject to a security setting, and if so, the instruction to the second image forming device is to erase the reproduced image data immediately, and if not, the instruction to the second image forming device is to erase the reproduced image data according to a delay time setting, and the second image forming apparatus, comprising: a receiver unit receiving the transferred reproduced image data; a memory unit storing the received reproduced image data; and an eraser unit erasing the corresponding reproduced image data in the memory unit according to the erase instruction transmitted from the first image forming apparatus.