The abelian category of quasicoherent sheaves on a schemes determine the scheme. This is an old result of Gabriel ("des categories abeliennes" 1962), proved in full generality by Rosenberg. This means that, QCoh(X)$\operatorname{QCoh}(X)$ does not only tell you the open subschemes of X$X$ but also gives you the structure sheaf ! I've known this result for some time but I had never looked at it in detail until today. I'll sketch what I have just learned hoping not to make big mistakes...
An abelian subcategory B$B$ of an abelian category A$A$ is said to be a thick subcategory if it is full and for any exact sequence in A$A$
0 ---> M'---> M ---> M'' ---> 0$$0\to M'\to M \to M''\to 0,$$
M$M$ belongs to B$B$ if, and only if M'$M'$ and M''$M''$ do.
If B$B$ is a thick subcategory of A$A$ there is a well defined localization A/B$A/B$, which is again an abelian category. A/B$A/B$ has the same objects as A$A$ and a morphism f:M--->N$f:M\to N$ in A/B$A/B$ is an isomorphism if, and only if ker f$\ker f$ and coker f$\operatorname{coker} f$ belong to B$B$.
Let T:A ---> A/B$T\colon A\to A/B$ be the localization functor. Then B$B$ is said to be a localizing subcategory if B$B$ is thick and T$T$ has a right adjoint. The condition of being localizing can be rephrased only in terms of A$A$ and B$B$. see Gabriel's thesis above (proposition 4 in chapter III).
Finally, if M$M$ is an object of A$A$, we denote by <M>$\langle M\rangle$; the smallest localizing subcategory containing M$M$.
Now let X$X$ be a scheme, j:U ---> X$j\colon U \to X$ an open embedding and i:Y ---> X$i\colon Y\to X$ its closed complement. Then there isare a bunch of adjunctions between the categories of quasicoherent sheaves of U,X,Y: i* $U,X,Y$:QCoh(Y) ---> QCoh(X)$i_*\colon \operatorname{QCoh}(Y)\to \operatorname{QCoh}(X)$ has a left adjoint i* :QCoh(X) ---> QCoh(Y)$i^*\colon \operatorname{QCoh}(X)\to \operatorname{QCoh}(Y)$ and a right adjoint i! :QCoh(X) ---> QCoh(Y)$i_!\colon \operatorname{QCoh}(X) \to \operatorname{QCoh}(Y)$. On the other hand, the functor j* :QCoh(X) ---> QCoh(U)$j^*\colon \operatorname{QCoh}(X)\to \operatorname{QCoh}(U)$ has a left adjoint j! :QCoh(U)--->QCoh(X)$j_!\colon \operatorname{QCoh}(U)\to \operatorname{QCoh}(X)$ and a right adjoint j* :QCoh(U) ---> QCoh(X)$j_*\colon \operatorname{QCoh}(U)\to \operatorname{QCoh}(X)$. This is sometimes called a recollement.
Let's assume that X$X$ is Noetherian and let A = QCoh(X)$A = \operatorname{QCoh}(X)$. We have an exact sequence of abelian categories
0 ---> QCoh(Y) ---> A ---> QCoh(U) ---> 0$$0 \to \operatorname{QCoh}(Y) \to A \to \operatorname{QCoh}(U) \to 0$$
in the sense that the category QCoh(Y)$\operatorname{QCoh}(Y)$ happens to be a localizing subcategory of A$A$ and its quotient is identified with QCoh(U)$\operatorname{QCoh}(U)$. The first map in the exact sequence is i* $i_*$ and the second j* $j^*$. Moreover, I think that QCoh(Y)$\operatorname{QCoh}(Y)$ is the smallest localizing subcategory of QCoh(X)$\operatorname{QCoh}(X)$ containing i* OY$i_*O_Y$. Gabriel proves that there are no more such localizing subcategories, that is closed subschemes of X$X$ correspond exactly to localizing subcategories <M>$\langle M\rangle$ generated by a single coherent sheaf (i.e. Noetherian object in A$A$). Moreover, irreducible closed subsets (the points in the underlying topological space of X$X$) are given by localizing subcategories <I>$\langle I\rangle$ for I$I$ an indecomposable injective. We have described the points of X$X$ and its closed sets in terms of only the category A$A$, so we can recover the underlying topological space of X$X$ from A$A$.
In particular, an open subscheme U$U$ of X$X$ gives a complementary closed subscheme Y$Y$, which is in correspondence with a localizing subcategory <M>$\langle M\rangle$ and, moreover, QCoh(U) = A/<M>$\operatorname{QCoh}(U) = A/\langle M\rangle$. So, responding to the queston above, for any f:U ---> X$f\colon U\to X$, U$U$ is an open subscheme if, and only if the kernel of f* :QCoh(X) ---> QCoh(U)$f^*\colon \operatorname{QCoh}(X) \to \operatorname{QCoh}(U)$ is a localizing subcategory of the form <M>$\langle M\rangle$ for a coherent sheaf M$M$.
Regarding the structure sheaf OX$O_X$ there is an isomorphism OX(U)between $O_X(U)$ and the ring of endomorphismendomorphisms of the identity functor on QCoh(U)$\operatorname{QCoh}(U)$ (which happens to be A/QCoh(Y)$A/\operatorname{QCoh}(Y)$), so the structure sheaf can be recovered only in terms of the category A$A$.