system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
[Star Trek] How does the Federation monitor the vast spaces between its star systems? Is there a dedicated sensor network? Specialized starships who continuously scan these areas?
gpt
Yes.

The Federation (and other societies) maintains a network of beacons, probes and sensors throughout space. Many are in orbit around planets or star systems, either collecting data or warning others away.

The Federation also maintains a large fleet (I.e. Starfleet) of scientific and exploration vessels whose main purpose is to collect data, encounter new races, chart stars and their behaviours as well as investigate, note, and report just about anything of interest. These vessels work in a region of space suited to their capabilities, however if needed elsewhere they will be reassigned.

By coordinating all of this via subspace communication the Federation is roughly aware of most things of note happening in Federation space, and vaguely aware beyond that, but thanks to its ship placement and design it can become intimately aware of anything in Federation space in about a day, and in about a week for elsewhere in the Alpha Quadrant. The Federation has little to no knowledge of other quadrants beyond the basic physical properties of the stars. 

Other societies have different equipment capable of detecting different things, which they may share with the Federation if they're in an alliance. An example would be the Dominion's deep space probe/sensor array which effectively allowed them to know the position of every ship in and around Cardassian space. The Dominion were notably at war with the Federation-Klingon-Romulan alliance at the time, so this sensor array was destroyed.