diff --git a/nibabel/cifti2/tests/test_caretspec.py b/nibabel/cifti2/tests/test_caretspec.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000000..547d315aa3
--- /dev/null
+++ b/nibabel/cifti2/tests/test_caretspec.py
@@ -0,0 +1,18 @@
+from pathlib import Path
+
+from nibabel.cifti2.caretspec import *
+
+from nibabel.testing import data_path
+
+
+def test_CaretSpecFile():
+    fsLR = CaretSpecFile.from_filename(Path(data_path) / "fsLR.wb.spec")
+
+    assert fsLR.metadata == {}
+    assert fsLR.version == "1.0"
+    assert len(fsLR.data_files) == 5
+
+    for df in fsLR.data_files:
+        assert isinstance(df, CaretSpecDataFile)
+        if df.data_file_type == 'SURFACE':
+            assert isinstance(df, SurfaceDataFile)
diff --git a/nibabel/filebasedimages.py b/nibabel/filebasedimages.py
index f7aecfb745..924bcac2a9 100644
--- a/nibabel/filebasedimages.py
+++ b/nibabel/filebasedimages.py
@@ -576,11 +576,13 @@ def to_bytes(self, **kwargs):
         return bio.getvalue()
 
     @classmethod
-    def from_url(klass, url):
+    def from_url(klass, url, timeout=5):
         """ Fetch image from remote location and construct an image
 
         Requires the ``requests`` library to be installed.
         """
         import requests
-        res = requests.get(url)
+        res = requests.get(url, timeout=timeout)
+        if not res.ok:
+            raise IOError(f"[Error {res.status_code}] Could not retrieve {url}")
         return klass.from_bytes(res.content)