What Are Fourth Parties?
Fourth Parties extend visibility beyond direct suppliers. They let clients and suppliers map and monitor critical downstream dependencies. This highlights concentration risks and supports new regulations like DORA and the UK Critical Third Parties Regime.
Fourth Party discovery helps clients understand their wider risk landscape by identifying the key suppliers of their suppliers. This reveals shared dependencies, exposes single points of failure, and supports transparency across the full supply chain.
How Does It Work?
Fourth Party visibility is built into Risk Ledger for clients and suppliers.
For Suppliers
Suppliers list their own critical suppliers (Fourth Parties) in the Supplier Profile. Enter the company name and website. Options include:
Existing organisations on the Risk Ledger network
New profiles for companies not yet on the platform (created as Unclaimed Profiles). Suppliers must keep these up to date during assessments.
To add a critical supplier, go to Assessment, then select Critical suppliers:
Then click Add supplier:
Search for existing suppliers and add as a critical supplier:
If the supplier isn’t listed, click Add new supplier. Enter the organisation’s name, location, and website:
Then:
And finally, view your critical suppliers in the list below:
For Clients
Clients see Fourth Party relationships in the About section of a supplier’s profile:
Network Visualisation Integration
Fourth Party connections display in the Network Visualisation. Go to the About section of a supplier’s profile to access the visualisation, trace impact paths, and assess risks. You can also export fourth party data to CSV.
Why It Matters
For Clients
Spot Hidden Concentration Risks: Understand which critical suppliers are dependent on the same fourth party providers. This highlights vulnerabilities that could trigger widespread disruption if a single downstream provider fails.
Support Regulatory Compliance: Stay audit-ready with visibility that supports regulatory frameworks requiring extended supply chain oversight, including:
Digital Operational Resilience Act (DORA): Requires tracking of subcontractors and concentration risk management.
PRA SS2/21: Mandates visibility into aggregate and fourth party risks.
UK Cyber Security & Resilience Bill (CSRB): Emphasises risk oversight across the full supply network.
UK Government Cyber Security Strategy**:** Encourages awareness of all suppliers impacting critical operations.
Faster Incident Response: When a fourth party experiences a breach or disruption, clients can instantly trace the blast radius across their connected suppliers.
Better Strategic Decisions: Use detailed dependency insights to improve supplier diversification strategies and conduct deeper due diligence during procurement.
For Suppliers
Reduce Assessment Fatigue: Instead of responding to multiple fourth party questionnaires from different clients, suppliers can declare their critical dependencies once, directly in their Supplier Profile.
Streamline Compliance: Demonstrate proactive risk management and support clients’ regulatory reporting obligations. Especially relevant under:
UK’s Critical Third Parties Regime: In effect since Jan 2025, it requires systemic suppliers to manage risks within their own supply chains.
DORA: Critical suppliers must now provide fourth party data with the same rigor applied to them.
Simplify Crisis Communications: Notify all your connected clients through Risk Ledger in the event of a fourth party disruption avoiding multiple, manual communications.
Boost Trust & Credibility: Being transparent about fourth party relationships shows maturity and positions you as a trusted, responsible partner potentially helping win more business.
Network Visualisation Benefits
The Fourth Parties feature enhances Risk Ledger’s powerful Network Visualisation, delivering:
Intuitive Risk Communication: Show boards and senior stakeholders a clear visual map of how your organisation fits into the broader supply chain, highlighting interdependencies and risk hotspots.
Reveal Hidden Risk Pathways: Move beyond static spreadsheets. Identify non-obvious connections and clusters of risk such as suppliers sharing the same critical fourth party.
Scalable Supply Chain Mapping: As your supply chain grows, network visualisation updates in real time. No need to manually track new relationships in complex spreadsheets.
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