system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
ELI5: Why does water cause electronic devices (I.e. cellphones) to malfunction even after said devices have completely dried?

I've heard putting them in rice works, though I've never had much luck.
gpt
Unless it's distilled water, water is actually pretty dirty. It's full of little particles and sediment. Take a really close look at a glass of unfiltered drinking water and you might probably see some. 

Anyway, when a device gets wet those particles settle on the microchips shorting out some of the connections (creating paths for electricity to go where it shouldn't).

That's why people say to soak a phone in distilled water then leave it on rice. The distilled water washes away the sediment and the dryness of the rice pulls the water out of the phone, like a tissue dipped into a cup of water.

I hope this is all accurate and simple enough, feel free to tell me if any of that is wrong or if there are better analogies. :)