Germaphobes, listen up! Japanese electronics maker Kyocera has developed a smartphone that's not only water-proof but soap-proof. That means after a busy day out on the job site or camping over the weekend, you can lather up the device and give it a good cleaning just as you would your hands.
The oddly-named Digno Rafre features a 5-inch HD TFT LCD display, 2GB of RAM and 16GB of local storage (expandable via microSD card slot). It packs a 13-megapixel rear camera, a 3,000mAh battery and ships with Android 5.1 Lollipop. The hardware itself isn't anything special; it's the soap-friendly technology that's most appealing here.
As you may know, smartphones are one of the filthiest objects we handle on a daily basis. In 2012, The Wall Street Journal had a lab test eight randomly selected phones from a Chicago office for a story on germs.
All of the phones were found to have abnormally high levels of coliforms which is a bacteria indicating fecal contamination (thankfully, none showed signs of E.coli or staphylococci). Dr. Donald Hendrickson, president of HML Labs and professor emeritus of medical microbiology at Ball State University, said the results suggest a lack of hand-washing and proper hygiene.
Kyocera doesn't yet have plans to bring the Digno Rafre overseas; no word yet on whether or not they'll license out the soap-proof technology, either.