third party

American  

noun

• third parties
  plural

1. any party to an incident, case, quarrel, etc., who is incidentally involved.

2. (in a two-party system) a political party formed as a dissenting or independent group from members of one or both of the two prevailing major parties.

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third party British  

noun

1. a person who is involved by chance or only incidentally in a legal proceeding, agreement, or other transaction, esp one against whom a defendant claims indemnity

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adjective

1. insurance providing protection against liability caused by accidental injury or death of other persons or damage to their property

   third-party insurance

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• third parties
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of third party

An Americanism dating back to 1795–1805

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Example Sentences

See Examples For:

third party

US regulators have published a consent order requiring Bank of America to work with a third party to identify and report suspicious transactions that went undetected.

From Barron's ● Oct. 13, 2026

Do NOT allow a third party unfettered access to your bank accounts or brokerage accounts.

From MarketWatch ● Oct. 12, 2026

The SEC’s framework comes with strict safeguards for corporate issuers: Before a venue can begin trading any stock tokenized by a third party, it must give the issuing company 30 days notice.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 7, 2026

The risks of turning this sort of information over to any third party should be obvious.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 2, 2026

"Yes, sir, he put through the sale—though he made it clear that he was buying Soldier Island for a third party, unnamed."

From "And Then There Were None" by Agatha Christie

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