Are electronics effected by magnets now a day. I remember while growing up people would tell me to not put magnets near electronics cause it could hurt them and erase data but I'm starting to think that maybe magnets don't have that effect anymore or never did, Could I lay a SD card on a cordless phone or near a magnet tool and still be OK? I know if you put a magnet on a floppy disk everything will be gone but we're way past those days.

On old Tvs, a Magnetic field(magnet) would distort the picture and color. A nearby speaker?
Years ago some one brought in a TV for repair, No picture, I removed back, it worked, after putting the back on and off a couple of times I noticed a Large speaker that had been added(Giant Speaker) on a 13" TV, the field was so strong it blacked the picture out.
Back of the cordles phone has a magnet for earpiece, could erase data, SD type cards may be vulnerable, would think it is magnetic.
A Magnetic Field got me stuck in the Everglades for 3 days, Night Time/Pitch Black, had to gather rain water and eat a shark. what had happened was, I had a Sharpening Steel in the Center console, when I pulled it out to sharpen, I noticed the compass swing 100 degrees, This was Before GPS, Loran was poor due to the angles between the stations. A Good Hand Bearing Compass is a Life saver.
superutails "but I'm starting to think that maybe magnets don't have that effect anymore or never did"
I think they always have(VCR tape, Audio Tape),and some future things will be vulnerable.

Magnets distort cathode ray rubes (CRT's). It can be reversed by degausing. You can easily see that effect.

Magnetic fields affect magnetic tapes (VCR, cassette etc). Magnetic fields could affect the cell phone on a temporary basis. Might affect range. Magnetic fields affect hard disk drives.

There is a non-volitile memory that is magnetic based, so it could affect that.

Anything that has transformers or coils especially for coupling can be affected such as a speaker on a cell phone.

In general, the effects are reverseable unless there is data stored on the magnetic media.

Hard drives have magnets in them and phones have magnets. I know that magnets can affect hard drives and phones but I think they have to be strong and not the weak ones found in phones and speakers.

Test with an SD card, nothing too important on it.
Most agree to avoid magnetic fields if sucepptible, for a chance of destruction, you can push things to the edge on about anything.

Yes. I put a magnet againts my computer and the screen was messed up and it was always crashing after that. But I don't know about SD cards and other stuff.

Yes but not only does the magnetic field mess with the sd card it also messes with ipods mp3s and phones making them run out of batery faster/ making them go hawire, making the screen go different colours. If the magnetic field is weak it won't have the same effect as a powerful magmetic field but it will still have a effect.
Hope you found that helpful