I asked Eleon about it. Not sure yet.
My idea was to connect it maybe to a radar system?
Or maybe a global organization like we have with EGS = Elemental Galactic Services.
If you register as “online” at EGS, the Trader will trade with you.
If not, they don’t but you can find black markets somewhere.
this is one good topic. I have very long time hoped that even the b list to be complete hide permanently. This list is very common tool to use it to plan attacks and defends depending which faction and how many is online and any list should not give that information… radar & alliance is the good way to handle it, so the information should be get with gaming methods, not from list.