Can ransomware affect ejected external hard drive?

Question

Can ransomware affect an external hard disk on Windows that has been ejected using "Safely remove" feature while keeping the drive plugged into my PC?

Answer 1

Your external hard drive has been ejected be the Safely remove feature in Windows, however it is still physically connected to the computer, and any program that has administrative access can remount it like in these examples including malicious software. Air gapping the external hard drive is a stronger way of preventing malware from accessing it.