Provided is a server that is capable of directly sending a notification of an error to a non-registered user who is not authenticated and permitted to use an image forming apparatus. An authenticating unit performs authentication permission according to authentication information of a user. A notification-event-setting unit sets to send a notification of a server error as a recognizable event to a non-registered user, who is not registered to perform authentication permission by the authenticating unit. An event-notifying unit notifies about the event set by the notification-event-setting unit when the error actually occurs.