If your car has ABS, remember that for the system to be effective, you must use full pressure on the brake pedal.  When needed, don't hesitate to slam full force on the brakes.  You will probably hear a grinding sound and you might feel the pedal pulsate under your foot.  Do not lift off!  The grinding and pulsating tell you that the ABS pump is doing its job of braking and releasing each wheel quickly to avoid lockup.  Use full braking force and concentrate on steering the car.

Another mistake that leads to accidents is that the driver hesitates in applying full force to the brakes.  Studies have shown that drivers usually depress the pedal lightly, then a few fractions of a second later, use full force.  In those fractions of a second, the car would have traveled several tens of meters, and the car won't be able to stop on time.  To correct this, manufacturers such as Mercedes and BMW have incorporated a Brake Assist system, which detects a potential panic stop and applies full force to the brakes, even if the driver is not applying full pressure on the brake pedal.  I wonder if they've considered what happens to the trailing car when Brake Assist intervenes, but then if it is a genuine panic stop, you won't have time to worry about the vehicle behind you anyway.

Other functions such as traction control

Since the ABS sensors and hardware are already present in many cars, some manufacturers have added some control features merely by tweaking the ABS software. 

Since the ABS can detect the rotation speed of a wheel, it can be programmed to brake a wheel that is spinning too fast compared to the others.  This is traction control.  In some systems, the traction control software can also instruct the engine computer to reduce torque.  In the Mercedes M-class 4x4, the front, rear and center differentials are all open.  With an open differential, when one wheel gets stuck, say in deep mud, it usually spins uncontrollably and the whole vehicle bogs down. However, the M-class uses its ABS system to brake the spinning wheel, thus transferring torque to the wheel or wheels that have traction.  Theoretically, this allows the M-class to keep moving even if only one wheel has grip-all without the weight and complexity of locking differentials.  There's no button to press-simply step on the gas for all it's worth.