diff --git a/src/main/java/org/archive/resource/html/ExtractingParseObserver.java b/src/main/java/org/archive/resource/html/ExtractingParseObserver.java
index e1f57b55..deb8c8c0 100644
--- a/src/main/java/org/archive/resource/html/ExtractingParseObserver.java
+++ b/src/main/java/org/archive/resource/html/ExtractingParseObserver.java
@@ -21,14 +21,19 @@ public class ExtractingParseObserver implements ParseObserver {
 	boolean inTitle = false;
 
 	protected static String cssUrlPatString = 
-		"url\\s*\\(\\s*([\\\\\"']*.+?[\\\\\"']*)\\s*\\)";
+		"url\\s*\\(\\s*((?:\\\\?[\"'])?.+?(?:\\\\?[\"'])?)\\s*\\)";
+	protected static String cssUrlTrimPatString =
+			"^(?:\\\\?[\"'])+|(?:\\\\?[\"'])+$";
 	protected static String cssImportNoUrlPatString = 
-		"@import\\s+(('[^']+')|(\"[^\"]+\")|(\\('[^']+'\\))|(\\(\"[^\"]+\"\\))|(\\([^)]+\\))|([a-z0-9_.:/\\\\-]+))\\s*;";
+			"@import\\s+((?:'[^']+')|(?:\"[^\"]+\")|(?:\\('[^']+'\\))|(?:\\(\"[^\"]+\"\\))|(?:\\([^)]+\\))|(?:[a-z0-9_.:/\\\\-]+))\\s*;";
 
 	protected static Pattern cssImportNoUrlPattern = Pattern
 			.compile(cssImportNoUrlPatString);
 
 	protected static Pattern cssUrlPattern = Pattern.compile(cssUrlPatString);
+
+	protected static Pattern cssUrlTrimPattern = Pattern.compile(cssUrlTrimPatString);
+
 	private final static int MAX_TEXT_LEN = 100;
 
 //	private static String GLOBAL_ATTR[] = {"background"};
@@ -372,36 +377,16 @@ private void patternCSSExtract(HTMLMetaData data, Pattern pattern, String conten
 		Matcher m = pattern.matcher(content);
 		int idx = 0;
 		int contentLen = content.length();
-		while((idx < contentLen) && m.find(idx)) {
+		if (contentLen > 100000)
+			// extract URLs only from the first 100 kB
+			contentLen = 100000;
+		while((idx < contentLen) && m.find()) {
+			idx = m.end();
 			String url = m.group(1);
-			int origUrlLength = url.length();
-			int urlStart = m.start(1);
-			int urlEnd = m.end(1);
-			idx = urlEnd;
-			if(url.length() < 2) {
-				continue;
-			}
-			if ((url.charAt(0) == '(') 
-					&& (url.charAt(origUrlLength-1) == ')')) {
-				url = url.substring(1, origUrlLength - 1);
-				urlStart += 1;
-				origUrlLength -= 2;
-			}
-			if (url.charAt(0) == '"') {
-				url = url.substring(1, origUrlLength - 1);
-				urlStart += 1;
-			} else if (url.charAt(0) == '\'') {
-				url = url.substring(1, origUrlLength - 1);
-				urlStart += 1;
-			} else if (url.charAt(0) == '\\') {
-				if(url.length() == 2)
-					continue;
-				url = url.substring(2, origUrlLength - 2);
-				urlStart += 2;
+			url = cssUrlTrimPattern.matcher(url).replaceAll("");
+			if (!url.isEmpty()) {
+				data.addHref("path","STYLE/#text","href", url);
 			}
-			int urlLength = url.length();
-			data.addHref("path","STYLE/#text","href",url);
-			idx += urlLength;
 		}
 	}
 }
diff --git a/src/test/java/org/archive/resource/html/ExtractingParseObserverTest.java b/src/test/java/org/archive/resource/html/ExtractingParseObserverTest.java
index 24b6c18a..bfbd6f02 100644
--- a/src/test/java/org/archive/resource/html/ExtractingParseObserverTest.java
+++ b/src/test/java/org/archive/resource/html/ExtractingParseObserverTest.java
@@ -19,7 +19,9 @@ public void testHandleStyleNodeExceptions() throws Exception {
 				"url (' ')",
 				"url('\")",
 				"url(')",
-				"url('\"')"
+				"url('\"')",
+				"url('\\\"\"')",
+				"url(''''')"
 		};
 		boolean except = false;
 		HTMLMetaData md = new HTMLMetaData(new MetaData());
@@ -37,6 +39,7 @@ public void testHandleStyleNodeExceptions() throws Exception {
 			assertFalse(except);
 		}
 	}
+
 	public void testHandleStyleNode() throws Exception {
 		String[][] tests = {
 				{""},
@@ -45,31 +48,36 @@ public void testHandleStyleNode() throws Exception {
 				{"url(\"foo.gif\")","foo.gif"},
 				{"url(\\\"foo.gif\\\")","foo.gif"},
 				{"url(\\'foo.gif\\')","foo.gif"},
-				
-		};
+				{"url(''foo.gif'')","foo.gif"},
+				{"url(  foo.gif  )","foo.gif"},
+				{"url('''')"},
+				{"url('foo.gif'')","foo.gif"},
+				};
 		for(String[] testa : tests) {
 			checkExtract(testa);
 		}
-		//		boolean except = false;
-//		HTMLMetaData md = new HTMLMetaData(new MetaData());
-//		ExtractingParseObserver epo = new ExtractingParseObserver(md);
-//		for(String css : tests) {
-//			try {
-//				TextNode tn = new TextNode(css);
-//				epo.handleStyleNode(tn);
-//			} catch(Exception e) {
-//				System.err.format("And the winner is....(%s)\n", css);
-//				e.printStackTrace();
-//				except = true;
-//				throw e;
-//			}
-//			assertFalse(except);
-//		}
 	}
+
+	/**
+	 * Test whether the pattern matcher does extract nothing and also does not
+	 * not hang-up if an overlong CSS link is truncated.
+	 */
+	public void testHandleStyleNodeNoHangupTruncated() throws Exception {
+		StringBuilder sb = new StringBuilder();
+		sb.append("url(");
+		for (int i = 0; i < 500000; i++)
+			sb.append('\'');
+		sb.append("foo.gif");
+		for (int i = 0; i < 499000; i++)
+			sb.append('\'');
+		String[] test = new String[1];
+		test[0] = sb.toString();
+		checkExtract(test);
+	}
+
 	private void checkExtract(String[] data) throws JSONException {
 //		System.err.format("CSS(%s) want[0](%s)\n",css,want[0]);
 		String css = data[0];
-		boolean except = false;
 		HTMLMetaData md = new HTMLMetaData(new MetaData());
 		ExtractingParseObserver epo = new ExtractingParseObserver(md);
 		try {
@@ -87,10 +95,11 @@ private void checkExtract(String[] data) throws JSONException {
 				
 				assertTrue(o instanceof JSONObject);
 				JSONObject jo = (JSONObject) o;
-				assertEquals(data[i],jo.getString("href"));
+				assertEquals("CSS link extraction failed for <" + css + ">",
+						data[i], jo.getString("href"));
 			}
 		} else {
-			assertNull(a);
+			assertNull("Expected no extracted link for <" + css + ">", a);
 		}
 	}