In the DC distribution system, to step down the DC voltage level from the AC grid voltage, the conventional topologies require multiple power conversion stages and bulky line-frequency transformers, which degrade their power density and cost-effectiveness. In addition, the conventional topologies suffer from a shoot-through problem resulting in their low system reliability. In this paper, to overcome the above issues, systematic design approaches of a three-phase buck rectifier with an uninterruptible power supply (UPS) and a protection algorithm are proposed to obtain the high reliability of the DC distribution system, which can deal with fault conditions and can regulate the output voltage level. It only requires a single stage of the three-phase buck rectifier. Also, a thyristor switch is added without any commutation circuits to cut off the output from the fault circuit. The shoot-through faults do not occur in the buck rectifier, leading to high reliability. A dual-active-bridge (DAB) DC-DC converter is applied as the UPS to supply the electric power from the battery when the buck rectifier is shut down under the fault conditions. Finally, the protection algorithm is proposed to detect the fault conditions and to regulate the output voltage level.