diff --git a/src/component/annotator/AnnotatorContent.tsx b/src/component/annotator/AnnotatorContent.tsx
index 1ec43025..f54a6bbc 100644
--- a/src/component/annotator/AnnotatorContent.tsx
+++ b/src/component/annotator/AnnotatorContent.tsx
@@ -35,8 +35,16 @@ const PREPROCESSING_INSTRUCTIONS = [
     shouldPreprocessNode: (node: any): boolean =>
       node.name && node.name === "a",
     preprocessNode: (node: any) => {
-      node.attribs["data-href"] = node.attribs.href;
-      delete node.attribs.href;
+      // Remove href from relative links, absolute links will open in blank tab
+      if (!Utils.isLink(node.attribs.href)) {
+        node.attribs["data-href"] = node.attribs.href;
+        delete node.attribs.href;
+      } else {
+        node.attribs["data-target"] = node.attribs.target;
+        node.attribs["target"] = "_blank";
+        node.attribs["data-rel"] = node.attribs.rel;
+        node.attribs["rel"] = "noopener noreferrer";
+      }
     },
   },
 ];
diff --git a/src/component/annotator/HtmlParserUtils.ts b/src/component/annotator/HtmlParserUtils.ts
index e0e20842..469d91ef 100644
--- a/src/component/annotator/HtmlParserUtils.ts
+++ b/src/component/annotator/HtmlParserUtils.ts
@@ -4,12 +4,33 @@ import render from "dom-serializer";
 
 const RDF_ATTRIBUTE_NAMES = ["about", "property", "resource", "typeof"];
 
+function removeAddedAttributes(elem: Element) {
+  // Restore links to their original state - see AnnotatorContent.PREPROCESSING_INSTRUCTIONS
+  if (elem.tagName === "a") {
+    if (elem.attribs["data-href"]) {
+      elem.attribs.href = elem.attribs["data-href"];
+      delete elem.attribs["data-href"];
+    }
+    delete elem.attribs["target"];
+    delete elem.attribs["rel"];
+    if (elem.attribs["data-rel"]) {
+      elem.attribs.rel = elem.attribs["data-rel"];
+      delete elem.attribs["data-rel"];
+    }
+    if (elem.attribs["data-target"]) {
+      elem.attribs.target = elem.attribs["data-target"];
+      delete elem.attribs["data-target"];
+    }
+  }
+}
+
 const HtmlParserUtils = {
   html2dom(html: string): Node[] {
     // Do not decode HTML entities (e.g., <) when parsing content for object representation, it caused issues
     // with rendering
     const options = { decodeEntities: false };
-    const handler = new DomHandler();
+    // @ts-ignore
+    const handler = new DomHandler(null, null, removeAddedAttributes);
     const parser = new HtmlParser(handler, options);
     parser.parseComplete(html);
     return handler.dom as Node[];
diff --git a/src/component/annotator/__tests__/Annotator.test.tsx b/src/component/annotator/__tests__/Annotator.test.tsx
index 31af1e03..99226224 100644
--- a/src/component/annotator/__tests__/Annotator.test.tsx
+++ b/src/component/annotator/__tests__/Annotator.test.tsx
@@ -118,7 +118,7 @@ describe("Annotator", () => {
     expect(wrapper.html().includes(sampleContent)).toBe(true);
   });
 
-  it("renders body of provided html content with replaced anchor hrefs", () => {
+  it("preserves absolute URL href anchors", () => {
     const htmlContent = surroundWithHtml(
       'This is a <a href="https://example.org/link">link</a>'
     );
@@ -138,7 +138,28 @@ describe("Annotator", () => {
       )
     );
     const sampleOutput =
-      'This is a <a data-href="https://example.org/link">link</a>';
+      'This is a <a href="https://example.org/link" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">link</a>';
+    expect(wrapper.html().includes(sampleOutput)).toBe(true);
+  });
+
+  it("renders body of provided html content with replaced relative anchor hrefs", () => {
+    const htmlContent = surroundWithHtml('This is a <a href="./link">link</a>');
+
+    const wrapper = mountWithIntl(
+      withWebSocket(
+        <MemoryRouter>
+          <Annotator
+            fileIri={fileIri}
+            vocabularyIri={vocabularyIri}
+            {...mockedCallbackProps}
+            {...stateProps}
+            initialHtml={htmlContent}
+            {...intlFunctions()}
+          />
+        </MemoryRouter>
+      )
+    );
+    const sampleOutput = 'This is a <a data-href="./link">link</a>';
     expect(wrapper.html().includes(sampleOutput)).toBe(true);
   });
 
diff --git a/src/component/annotator/__tests__/HtmlParserUtils.test.ts b/src/component/annotator/__tests__/HtmlParserUtils.test.ts
new file mode 100644
index 00000000..620db37f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/src/component/annotator/__tests__/HtmlParserUtils.test.ts
@@ -0,0 +1,22 @@
+import { Element } from "domhandler";
+import HtmlParserUtils from "../HtmlParserUtils";
+
+describe("HtmlParserUtils", () => {
+  describe("html2dom", () => {
+    it("remove target and rel attributes added when rendering HTML", () => {
+      const html =
+        '<a href="http://example.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Example</a>';
+      const nodes = HtmlParserUtils.html2dom(html);
+      expect((nodes[0] as Element).attribs.href).toEqual("http://example.com");
+      expect((nodes[0] as Element).attribs.target).not.toBeDefined();
+      expect((nodes[0] as Element).attribs.rel).not.toBeDefined();
+    });
+
+    it("set href attribute to data-href attribute created when rendering HTML", () => {
+      const html = '<a data-href="./about.html">Example</a>';
+      const nodes = HtmlParserUtils.html2dom(html);
+      expect((nodes[0] as Element).attribs.href).toEqual("./about.html");
+      expect((nodes[0] as Element).attribs["data-href"]).not.toBeDefined();
+    });
+  });
+});
diff --git a/src/util/Utils.ts b/src/util/Utils.ts
index 45b54beb..b4fd2cb9 100644
--- a/src/util/Utils.ts
+++ b/src/util/Utils.ts
@@ -51,10 +51,11 @@ const Utils = {
    */
   isLink(str: string): boolean {
     return (
-      str.startsWith("http://") ||
-      str.startsWith("https://") ||
-      str.startsWith("ftp://") ||
-      str.startsWith("sftp://")
+      str !== undefined &&
+      (str.startsWith("http://") ||
+        str.startsWith("https://") ||
+        str.startsWith("ftp://") ||
+        str.startsWith("sftp://"))
     );
   },