Waterproof phones are beyond old news in Japan; practically every phone released by a domestic manufacturer has been toilet-droppable for several years. But until now, that waterproofing didn’t protect phones from the kind of rigorous scrubbing needed to actually clean the thing and kill bacteria. To address this deficit, Kyocera’s new Digno Rafre is pitched as the world’s first soap-proof phone.
The Rafre is designed to be used in all kinds of environments without fear of getting dirty, since it can be cleaned off easily with hand soap. Kyocera says it’s ideal for use in the kitchen, outdoors, or even the bath — the phone has an integrated 1seg TV tuner and, brilliantly, there’s a rubber duck-shaped stand to prop it up.
Japan now has a soap-proof, washable phone for germaphobic bath lovers [The Verge]