block certain url via RewriteRule

I would like to prevent the access of certain url with this code by adding on conf.d/security.conf this:

RewriteEngine On
RewriteRule ^/?author=([0-9]*) - [L,R=404]

For any reason I can’t see the block access:

[13/Mar/2022:21:18:57 +0100] "GET /?author=1 HTTP/1.1" 301 - 467329
[13/Mar/2022:21:18:57 +0100] "GET /?author=2 HTTP/1.1" 200 32367 531687
174860

What’s wrong on the RewriteRule directive?